University  of  California  •  Berkeley 

S.  GRISWOLD  MORLEY  COLLECTION 


SESAME    AND    LILIES. 

TWO    LECTURES. 


SESAME    AND    LILIES 

Ciuo  fates 

DELIVERED  AT  MANCHESTER  IN  1864. 


BT 

JOHN  EUSKIN,  M.A. 

1.  OF  KINGS1    TREASURIES. 

2.  OF    QUEENS'    GARDENS. 

uarto  -fr-$  #apa$  avfot}  vrtaytt,  xai  dyopa^st  toy  aypbv  ixtlvov.'" 


NEW  YORK: 

JOHN  WILEY  &  SON,  535  BROADWAY. 
1866 


PREFACE. 


A  PASSAGE  in  the  fifty-third  page  of  this  book, 
referring  to  Alpine  travellers,  will  fall  harshly  on  the 
reader's  ear  since  it  has  been  sorrowfully  enforced  by 
the  deaths  on  Mont  Cervin.  I  leave  it,  nevertheless,  as  it 
stood,  for  I  do  not  now  write  unadvisedly,  and  think 
it  wrong  to  cancel  what  has  once  been  thoughtfully  said ; 
but  it  must  not  so  remain  without  a  few  added  words. 

No  blame  ought  to  attach  to  the  Alpine  tourist  for 
incurring  danger.  There  is  usually  sufficient  cause,  and 
real  reward,  for  all  difficult  work;  and  even  were  it 
otherwise,  some  experience  of  distinct  peril,  and  the 
acquirement  of  habits  of  quick  and  calm  action  in  its 
presence,  are  necessary  elements,  at  some  period  of  life,  in 
the  formation  of  manly  character.  The  blame  of  bribing 
guides  into  danger  is  a  singular  accusation,  in  behalf  of  a 
people  who  have  made  mercenary  soldiers  of  themselves 
for  centuries,  without  any  one's  thinking  of  giving  their 


yi  PREFACE. 

fidelity  better  employment:  though,  indeed,  the  piece  of 
work  they  did  at  the  gate  of  the  Tuileries,  however  useless, 
was  no  unwise  one;  and  their  lion  of  flawed  molasse 
at  Lucerne,  worthless  in  point  of  art  though  it  be,  is  never 
theless  a  better  reward  than  much  pay;  and  a  better 
ornament  to  the  old  town  than  the  Schweizer  Hof,  or  flat 
new  quay,  for  the  promenade  of  those  travellers  who  do 
not  take  guides  into  danger.  The  British  public  are  how 
ever,  at  home,  so  innocent  of  ever  buying  their  fellow 
creatures'  lives,  that  we  may  justly  expect  them  to  be 
punctilious  abroad !  They  do  not,  perhaps,  often  calculate 
how  many  souls  flit  annually,  choked  in  fire-damp  and  sea- 
sand,  from  economically  watched  shafts,  and  economically 
manned  ships ;  nor  see  the  fiery  ghosts  writhe  up  out 
of  every  scuttleful  of  cheap  coals :  nor  count  how  many 
threads  of  girlish  life  are  cut  off  and  woven  annually  by 
painted  Fates,  into  breadths  of  ball-dresses;  or  soaked 
away,  like  rotten  hemp-fibre,  in  the  inlet  of  Cocytus  which 
overflows  the  Grassmarket  where  flesh  is  as  grass.  We 
need  not,  it  seems  to  me,  loudly  blame  any  one  for  paying 
a  guide  to  take  a  brave  walk  with  him.  Therefore,  gentle 
men  of  the  Alpine  Club,  as  much  danger  as  you  care 
to  face,  by  all  means ;  but,  if  it  please  you,  not  so  much 
talk  of  it.  The  real  ground  for  reprehension  of  Alpine 


PREFACE.  Vii 

climbing  is  that,  with,  less  cause,  it  excites  more  vanity 
than  any  other  athletic  skill.  A  good  horseman  knows 
what  it  has  cost  to  make  him  one ;  everybody  else  knows  it 
too,  and  knows  that  he  is  one ;  he  need  not  ride  at  a  fence 
merely  to  show  his  seat.  But  credit  for  practice  in  climb 
ing  can  only  be  claimed  after  success,  which,  though 
perhaps  accidental  and  unmerited,  must  yet  be  attained  at 
all  risks,  or  the  shame  of  defeat  borne  with  no  evidence  of 
the  difficulties  encountered.  At  this  particular  period,  also, 
the  distinction  obtainable  by  first  conquest  of  a  peak  is  as 
tempting  to  a  traveller  as  the  discovery  of  a  new  element 
to  a  chemist,  or  of  a  new  species  to  a  naturalist.  Vanity  is 
never  so  keenly  excited  as  by  competitions  which  involve 
chance ;  the  course  of  science  is  continually  arrested,  and 
its  nomenclature  fatally  confused,  by  the  eagerness  of  even 
wise  and  able  men  to  establish  their  priority  in  an  unim 
portant  discovery,  or  obtain  vested  right  to  a  syllable  in  a 
deformed  word ;  and  many  an  otherwise  sensible  person 
will  risk  his  life  for  the  sake  of  a  line  in  future  guide 
books,  to  the  fact  that  " horn  was  first  ascended  by  Mr. 

X.  in  the  year "; — never  reflecting  that  of  all  the  lines 

in  the  page,  the   one  he   has  thus  wrought  for  will  be 
precisely  the  least  interesting  to  the  reader. 

It  is  not  therefore  strange,  however  much  to  be  regretted, 


Vlll  PREFACE. 

that  while  no  gentleman  boasts  in  other  eases  of  his  saga 
city  or  his  courage — while  no  good  soldier  talks  of  the 
charge  he  led,  nor  any  good  sailor  of  the  helm  he  held, — • 
every  man  among  the  Alps  seems  to  lose  his  senses  and 
modesty  with  the  fall  of  the  barometer,  and  returns  from 
his  Nephelo-coccygia  brandishing  his  ice-axe  in  everybody's 
face.  Whatever  the  Alpine  Club  have  done,  or  may  yet 
accomplish,  in  a  sincere  thirst  for  mountain  knowledge,  and 
in  happy  sense  of  youthful  strength  and  play  of  animal 
spirit,  they  have  done,  and  will  do,  wisely  and  well ;  but 
whatever  they  are  urged  to  by  mere  sting  of  competition 
atid  itch  of  praise,  they  will  do,  as  all  vain  things  must  be 
done  for  ever,  foolishly  and  ill.  It  is  a  strange  proof 
of  that  absence  of  any  real  national  love  of  science,  of 
which  I  have  had  occasion  to  speak  in  the  text,  that  no 
entire  survey  of  the  Alps  has  yet  been  made  by  properly 
qualified  men ;  and  that,  except  of  the  chain  of  Chamouni, 
no  accurate  maps  exist,  nor  any  complete  geological  section 
even  of  that.  But  Mr.  Eeilly's  survey  of  that  central  group, 
and  the  generally  accurate  information  collected  in  the 
guide-book  published  by  the  Club,  are  honourable  results 
of  English  adventure  ;  and  it  is  to  be  hoped  that  the  con 
tinuance  of  such  work  will  gradually  put  an  end  to  the 
vulgar  excitement  which  looked  upon  the  granite  of  the 


PREFACE.  IX 

Alps  only  as  an  unoccupied  advertisement  wall  for  chalk 
ing  names  upon. 

Kespecting  the  means  of  accomplishing  such  work  with 
least  risk,  there  was  a  sentence  in  the  article  of  our  leading 
public  journal,  which  deserves,  and  requires  expansion. 

"  Their  "  (the  Alpine  club's)  "  ropes  must  not  break." 

Certainly  not !  nor  any  one  else's  ropes,  if  they  may  be 
rendered  unbreakable  by  honesty  of  make;  seeing  that 
more  lives  hang  by  them  on  moving  than  on  motionless 
seas.  The  records  of  the  last  gale  at  the  Cape  may  teach 
us  that  economy  in  the  manufacture  of  cables  is  not  always 
a  matter  for  exultation ;  and,  on  the  whole,  it  might  even 
be  well  in  an  honest  country,  sending  out,  and  up  and 
down,  various  lines  east  and  west,  that  nothing  should 
break ;  banks, — words, — nor  dredging  tackle. 

Granting,  however,  such  praise  and  such  sphere  of 
exertion  as  we  thus  justly  may,  to  the  spirit  of  adventure, 
there  is  one  consequence  of  it,  coming  directly  under  my 
own  cognizance,  of  which  I  cannot  but  speak  with  utter 
regret, — the  loss,  namely,  of  all  real  understanding  of  the 
character  and  beauty  of  Switzerland,  by  the  country's  being 
now  regarded  as  half  watering-place,  half  gymnasium.  It 
is  indeed  true  that  under  the  influence  of  the  pride  which 
gives  poignancy  to  the  sensations  which  others  cannot 


X  PKEFACE. 

share  with  us  (and  a  not  unjustifiable  zest  to  the  pleasure 
which  we  have  worked  for),  an  ordinary  traveller  will 
usually  observe  and  enjoy  more  on  a  difficult  excursion 
than  on  an  easy  one ;  and  more  in  objects  to  which  he  is 
unaccustomed  than  in  those  with  which  he  is  familiar.  He 
will  notice  with  extreme  interest  that  snow  is  white  on  the 
top  of  a  hill  in  June,  though  he  would  have  attached  little 
importance  to  the  same  peculiarity  in  a  wreath  at  the 
bottom  of  a  hill  in  January.  He  will  generally  find  more 
to  admire  in  a  cloud  under  his  feet,  than  in  one  over  his 
head ;  and,  oppressed  by  the  monotony  of  a  sky  which  is 
prevalently  blue,  will  derive  extraordinary  satisfaction 
from  its  approximation  to  black.  Add  to  such  grounds  of 
delight  the  aid  given  to  the  effect  of  whatever  is  impressive 
in  the  scenery  of  the  high  Alps,  by  the  absence  of  ludicrous 
or  degrading  concomitants ;  and  it  ceases  to  be  surprising 
that  Alpine  excursionists  should  be  greatly  pleased,  or 
that  they  should  attribute  their  pleasure  to  some  true  and 
increased  apprehension  of  the  nobleness  of  natural  scenery. 
But  no  impression  can  be  more  false.  The  real  beauty  of 
the  Alps  is  to  be  seen,  and  seen  only,  where  all  may  see  it, 
the  child,  the  cripple,  and  the  man  of  grey  hairs.  There  is 
more  true  loveliness  in  a  single  glade  of  pasture  shadowed 
by  pine,  or  gleam  of  rocky  brook,  or  inlet  of  unsullied  lake, 


PREFACE.  XI 

among  the  lower  Bernese  and  Savoyard  hills,  than  in  the 
entire  field  of  jagged  gneiss  which  crests  the  central  ridge 
from  the  Shreckhorn  to  the  Yiso.  The  valley  of  Cluse, 
through  which  unhappy  travellers  consent  now  to  be 
invoiced,  packed  in  baskets  like  fish,  so  only  that  they  may 
cheaply  reach,  in  the  feverous  haste  which  has  become  the 
law  of  their  being,  the  glen  of  Chamouni  whose  every 
lovely  foreground  rock  has  now  been  broken  up  to  build 
hotels  for  them,  contains  more  beauty  in  half  a  league  of  it, 
than  the  entire  valley  they  have  devastated,  and  turned 
into  a  casino,  did  in  its  uninjured  pride ;  and  that  passage 
of  the  Jura  by  Olten  (between  Basle  and  Lucerne),  which  is 
by  the  modern  tourist  triumphantly  effected  through  a 
tunnel  in  ten  minutes,  between  two  piggish  trumpet  grunts 
proclamatory  of  the  ecstatic  transit,  used  to  show  from 
every  turn  and  sweep  of  its  winding  ascent,  up  which  one 
sauntered,  gathering  wild -flowers,  for  half  a  happy  day, 
diviner  aspects  of  the  distant  Alps  than  ever  were  achieved 
by  toil  of  limb,  or  won  by  risk  of  life. 

There  is  indeed  a  healthy  enjoyment  both  in  engineers' 
work,  and  in  schoolboys'  play ;  the  making  and  mending 
of  roads  has  its  true  enthusiasms,  and  I  have  still  pleasure 
enough  in  mere  scrambling  to  wonder  not  a  little  at 
the  supreme  gravity  with  which  apes  exercise  their 


Xll  PREFACE. 

superior  powers  in  that  kind,  as  if  profitless  to  them. 
But  neither  macadamisation,  nor  tunnelling,  nor  rope 
ladders,  will  ever  enable  one  human  creature  to  understand 
the  pleasure  in  natural  scenery  felt  by  Theocritus  or  Yirgil ; 
and  I  believe  the  athletic  health  of  our  schoolboys  might 
be  made  perfectly  consistent  with  a  spirit  of  more  courtesy 
and  reverence,  both  for  men  and  things,  than  is  recog 
nisable  in  the  behaviour  of  modern  youth.  Some  year  or 
two  back,  I  was  staying  at  the  Montanvert  to  paint  Alpine 
roses,  and  went  every  day  to  watch  the  budding  of  a 
favourite  bed,  which  was  rounding  into  faultless  bloom 
beneath  a  cirque  of  rock,  high  enough,  as  I  hoped,  and 
close  enough,  to  guard  it  from  rude  eyes  and  plucking 
hands,  But, 

"  Tra  erto  e  piano  era  un  sentiero  ghembo, 
Che  ne  condusse  in  fianco  della  lacca," 

and  on  the  day  it  reached  the  fulness  of  its  rubied  fire,  I 
was  standing  near  when  it  was  discovered  by  a  forager  on 
the  flanks  of  a  travelling  school  of  English  and  German 
lads.  He  shouted  to  his  companions,  and  they  swooped 
down  upon  it ;  threw  themselves  into  it,  rolled  over  and 
over  in  it,  shrieked,  hallooed,  and  fought  in  it,  trampled 
it  down,  and  tore  it  up  by  the  roots  breathless  at  last 


PREFACE.  xiii 

with  rapture  of  ravage,  they  fixed  the  brightest  of  the 
remnant  blossoms  of  it  in  their  caps,  and  went  on  their 
way  rejoicing. 

They  left  me  much  to  think  upon;  partly  respecting 
the  essential  power  of  the  beauty  which  could  so  excite 
them,  and  partly  respecting  the  character  of  the  youth 
which  could  only  be  excited  to  destroy.  But  the  incident 
was  a  perfect  type  of  that  irreverence  for  natural  beauty 
with  respect  to  which  I  said  in  the  text,  at  the  place 
already  indicated,  "You  make  railroads  of  the  aisles  of 
the  cathedrals  of  the  earth,  and  eat  off  their  altars." 
For  indeed  all  true  lovers  of  natural  beauty  hold  it  in 
reverence  so  deep,  that  they  would  as  soon  think 
of  climbing  the  pillars  of  the  choir  of  Beauvais  for 
a  gymnastic  exercise,  as  of  making  a  play -ground  of 
Alpine  snow :  and  they  would  not  risk  one  hour  of  their 
joy  among  the  hill  meadows  on  a  May  morning,  for  the 
fame  or  fortune  of  having  stood  on  every  pinnacle  of  the 
silver  temple,  and  beheld  the  kingdoms  of  the  world 
from  it.  Love  of  excitement  is  so  far  from  being  love 
of  beauty,  that  it  ends  always  in  a  joy  in  its  exact 
reverse ;  joy  in  destruction, — as  of  my  poor  roses, — or  in 
actual  details  of  death  ;  until,  in  the  literature  of  the  day, 
11  nothing  is  too  dreadful,  or  too  trivial,  for  the  greed  of 


XIV  PREFACE. 

the  public."*  And  in  politics,  apathy,  irreverence,  and 
lust  of  luxury  go  hand  in  hand,  until  the  best  solem 
nization  which  can  be  conceived  for  the  greatest  event 
in  modern  European  history,  the  crowning  of  Florence 
capital  of  Italy,  is  the  accursed  and  ill-omened  folly  of 
casting  down  her  old  walls,  'and  surrounding  her  with  a 
"  boulevard ;"  and  this  at  the  very  time  when  every 
stone  of  her  ancient  cities  is  more  precious  to  her  than 
the  gems  of  a  Urim  breastplate,  and  when  every  nerve 
of  her  heart  and  brain  should  have  been  strained 
to  redeem  her  guilt  and  fulfil  her  freedom.  It  is  not  by 
making  roads  round  Florence,  but  through  Calabria,  that 
she  should  begin  her  Eoman  causeway  work  again;  and 
her  fate  points  her  march,  not  on  boulevards  by  Arno, 
but  waist-deep  in  the  lagoons  at  Venice.  Not  yet,  indeed ; 
but  five  years  of  patience  and  discipline  of  her  youth 
would  accomplish  her  power,  and  sweep  the  martello 
towers  from  the  cliffs  of  Verona,  and  the  ramparts  from  the 
marsh  of  Mestre.  But  she  will  not  teach  her  youth  that 
discipline  on  boulevards. 

Strange,  that  while  we  both,  French  and  English,  can 
give  lessons  in  war,  we  only  corrupt  other  nations  when 
they  imitate  either  our  pleasures  or  our  industries.     We 
*  Pall  Matt  Gazette,  August  15th,  article  on  the  Forward  murders. 


PREFACE.  XV 

English,  had  we  loved  Switzerland  indeed,  should  have  stri 
ven  to  elevate,  but  not  to  disturb,  the  simplicity  of  her  people, 
by  teaching  them  the  sacredness  of  their  fields  and  waters, 
the  honour  of  their  pastoral  and  burgher  life,  and  the 
fellowship  in  glory  of  the  grey  turreted  walls  round  their 
ancient  cities,  with  their  cottages  in  their  fair  groups  by  the 
forest  and  lake.  Beautiful,  indeed,  upon  the  mountains, 
had  been  the  feet  of  any  who  had  spoken  peace  to  their 
children ; — who  had  taught  those  princely  peasants  to 
remember  their  lineage,  and  their  league  with  the  rocks  of 
the  field ;  that  so  they  might  keep  their  mountain  waters 
pure,  and  their  mountain  paths  peaceful,  and  their  tradi 
tions  of  domestic  life  holy.  We  have  taught  them 
(incapable  by  circumstances  and  position  of  ever  becoming 
a  great  commercial  nation),  all  the  foulness  of  the  modern 
lust  of  wealth,  without  its  practical  intelligences ;  and  we 
have  developed  exactly  the  weakness  of  their  temperament 
by  which  they  are  liable  to  meanest  ruin.  Of  the  ancient 
architecture  and  most  expressive  beauty  of  their  country 
there  is  now  little  vestige  left ;  and  it  is  one  of  the  few  rea 
sons  which  console  me  for  the  advance  of  life,  that  I  am  old 
enough  to  remember  the  time  when  the  sweet  waves  of  the 
Eeuss  and  Limmat  (now  foul  with  the  refuse  of  manu 
facture)  were  as  crystalline  as  the  heaven  above  them; 


XVI  PEEFACE. 

when  her  pictured  bridges  and  embattled  towers  ran 
unbroken  round  Lucerne  ;  when  the  Ehone  flowed  in  deep- 
green,  softly  dividing  currents  round  the  wooded  ramparts 
of  Geneva  ;  and  when  from  the  marble  roof  of  the  western 
vault  of  Milan,  I  could  watch  the  Kose  of  Italy  flush  in  the 
first  morning  light,  before  a  human  foot  had  sullied  its 
summit,  or  the  reddening  dawn  on  its  rocks  taken  shadow 
of  sadness  from  the  crimson  which  long  ago  stained  the 
ripples  of  Otterburn. 


SESAME  AJSTD  LILIES. 


LECTURE    I.—  SESAME 

OP  KINGS*   TREASURIES. 


*   *  * 


I  BELIEVE,  ladies  and  gentlemen,  that  my  first  duty  this  even 
irrg  is  to  ask  your  pardon  for  the  ambiguity  of  title  under 
which  the  subject  of  lecture  has  been  announced  ;  and  for 
having  endeavoured,  as  you  may  ultimately  think,  to  obtain 
your  audience  under  false  pretences.  For  indeed  I  am  not 
going  to  talk  of  kings,  known  as  regnant,  nor  of  treasuries, 
understood  to  contain  wealth  ;  but  of  quite  another  order  of 
royalty,  and  material  of  riches,  than  those  usually  acknow 
ledged.  And  I  had  even  intended  to  ask  your  attention  for 
a  little  while  on  trust,  and  (as  sometimes  one  contrives  in 
taking  a  friend  to  see  a  favourite  piece  of  scenery)  to  hide 
what  I  wanted  most  to  show,  with  such  imperfect  cunning 
as  I  might,  until  we  had  unexpectedly  reached  the  best 
point  of  view  by  winding  paths.  But  since  my  good  plain- 
*  Job  zxviii.  5,  6. 


6  SESAME   AND   LILIES. 

spoken  friend,  Canon  Anson,  has  already  partly  anticipated 
my  reserved  "  trot  for  the  avenue "  in  his  first  advertised 
title  of  subject,  "  How  and  What  to  Read ; " — and  as  also  I 
have  heard  it  said,  by  men  practised  in  public  address,  that 
hearers  are  never  so  much  fatigued  as  by  the  endeavour  to 
follow  a  speaker  who  gives  them  no  clue  to  his  purpose,  I 
will  take  the  slight  mask  off  at  once,  and  tell  you  plainly 
that  I  want  to  speak  to  you  about  books;  and  about  the 
way  we  read  them,  and  could,  or  should  read  them.  A 
grave  subject,  you  will  say ;  and  a  wide  one !  Yes ;  so 
wide  that  I  shall  make  no  effort  to  touch  the  compass  of 
it.  I  will  try  only  to  bring  before  you  a  few  simple  thoughts 
about  reading,  which  press  themselves  upon  me  every  day 
more  deeply,  as  I  watch  the  course  of  the  public  mind  with 
respect  to  our  daily  enlarging  means  of  education,  and  the 
answeringly  wider  spreading,  on  the  levels,  of  the  irrigation 
of  literature.  It  happens  that  I  have  practically  some  con 
nexion  with  schools  for  different  classes  of  youth ;  and  I 
receive  many  letters  from  parents  respecting  the  education 
of  their  children.  In  the  mass  of  these  letters,  I  am  always 
struck  by  the  precedence  which  the  idea  of  a  "  position  in 
life"  takes  above  all  other  thoughts  in  the  parents' — more 
especially  in  the  mothers' — minds.  "The  education  befit 
ting  such  and  such  a  station  in  life" — this  is  the  phrase, 
this  the  object,  always.  They  never  seek,  as  far  as  I  cai> 


make  out,  an  education  good  in  itself:  the  conception  of 
abstract  Tightness  in  training  rarely  seems  reached  by  the 
writers.  But  an  education  "which  shall  keep  a  good  coat 
on  my  son's  back ; — an  education  which  shall  enable  him  to 
ring  with  confidence  the  visitors'  bell  at  double-belled  doors ; 
— education  which  shall  result  ultimately  in  establishment  of 
a  double-belled  door  to  his  own  house ;  in  a  word,  which 
shall  lead  to  advancement  in  life."  It  never  seems  to  occur 
to  the  parents  that  there  may  be  an  education  which,  in  itself. 
is  advancement  in  Life  ;— that  any  other  than  that  may  per- 
hnps  be  advancement  in  Death ;  and  that  this  essential  edu 
cation  might  be  more  easily  got,  or  given,  than  they  fancy, 
if  they  set  about  it  in  the  right  way;  while  it  is  for  no 
price,  and  by  no  favour,  to  be  got,  if  they  set  about  it  in 
the  wrong. 

Indeed,  among  the  ideas  most  prevalent  and  effective  in 
the  mind  of  this  busiest  of  countries,  I  suppose  the  first — 
at  least  that  which  is  confessed  with  the  greatest  frankness, 
and  put  forward  as  the  fittest  stimulus  to  youthful  exertion 
— is  this  of  "  Advancement  in  life."  My  main  purpose  this 
evening  is  to  determine,  with  you,  what  this  idea  practically 
includes,  and  what  it  should  include. 

Practically,  then,  at  present,  "  advancement  in  life  "  means 
becoming  conspicuous  in  life ; — obtaining  a  position  which 
shall  be  acknowledged  by  others  to  be  respectable  or  honour- 


8  SESAME   AND   LILIES. 

able.  We  do  not  understand  by  this  advancement,  in  gene 
ral,  the  mere  making  of  money,  but  the  being  known  to 
have  made  it;  not  the  accomplishment  of  any  great  aim, 
but  the  being  seen  to  have  accomplished  it.  In  a  word,  we 
mean  the  gratification  of  our  thirst  for  applause.  That 
thirst,  if  the  last  infirmity  of  noble  minds,  is  also  the  first 
infirmity  of  weak  ones ;  and,  on  the  whole,  the  strongest 
impulsive  influence  of  average  humanity :  the  greatest  efforts 
of  the  race  have  always  been  traceable  to  the  love  of  praise, 
as  its  greatest  catastrophes  to  the  love  of  pleasure. 

I  am  not  about  to  attack  or  defend  this  impulse.  I  want 
you  only  to  feel  how  it  lies  at  the  root  of  effort ;  especially 
of  all  modern  effort.  It  is  the  gratification  of  vanity  which 
is,  with  us,  the  stimulus  of  toil,  and  balm  of  repose;  so 
closely  does  it  touch  the  very  springs  of  life,  that  the 
wounding  of  our  vanity  is  always  spoken  of  (and  truly)  as 
in  its  measure  mortal;  we  call  it  "  mortification,"  using  the 
same  expression  which  we  should  apply  to  a  gangrenous  and 
incurable  bodily  hurt.  And  although  few  of  us  may  be  phy 
sicians  enough  to  recognise  the  various  effect  of  this  passion 
upon  health  and  energy,  I  believe  most  honest  men  know, 
and  would  at  once  acknowledge,  its  leading  power  with 
them  as  a  motive.  The  seaman  does  not  commonly  desire 
to  be  made  captain  only  because  he  knows  he  can  manage 
the  ship  better  than  any  other  sailor  on  board.  He  wants 


9 

to  be  made  captain  that  he  may  be  catted  captain.  The 
clergyman  does  not  usually  want  to  be  made  a  bishop  only 
because  he  believes  that  no  other  hand  can,  as  firmly  as 
his,  direct  the  diocese  through  its  difficulties.  He  wants  to 
be  made  bishop  primarily  that  he  may  be  called  "  My  Lord." 
And  a  prince  does  not  usually  desire  to  enlarge,  or  a  subject 
to  gain,  a  kingdom  because  he  believes  that  no  one  else  can 
as  well  serve  the  state  upon  the  throne ;  but,  briefly,  because 
he  wishes  to  be  addressed  as  "Your  Majesty,"  by  as  many 
lips  as  may  be  brought  to  such  utterance. 

This,  then,  being  the  main  idea  of  advancement  in  life, 
the  force  of  it  applies,  for  all  of  us,  according  to  our  station, 
particularly  to  that  secondary  result  of  such  advancement 
which  we  call  "getting  into  good  society."  We  want  to 
get  into  good  society,  not  that  we  may  have  it,  but  that 
we  may  be  seen  in  it ;  and  our  notion  of  its  goodness  de 
pends  primarily  on  its  conspicuousness. 

Will  you  pardon  me  if  I  pause  for  a  moment  to  put  what  I 
fear  you  may  think  an  impertinent  question?  I  never  can 
go  oi»with  an  address  unless  I  feel,  or  know,  that  my  audi 
ence  are  either  with  me  or  against  me :  (I  do  not  much  care 
which,  in  beginning ;)  but  I  must  know  where  they  are ;  and 
I  would  fain  find  put,  at  this  instant,  whether  you  think  1 
am  putting  the  motives  of  popular  action  too  low.  I  am 
resolved  to-night,  to  state  them  low  enough  to  be  admitted 


10  SESAME  AND  LILIES. 

as  probable  ;  for  whenever,  in  my  writings  on  Political  Eco- 
nomy,  I  assume  that  a  little  honesty,  or  generosity, — or  what 
used  to  be  called  "  virtue  " — may  be  calculated  upon  as  a 
human  motive  of  action,  people  always  answer  me,  saying, 
"You  must  not  calculate  on  that:  that  is  not  in  human 
nature:  you  must  not  assume  anything  to  be  common  to 
men  but  acquisitiveness  and  jealousy;  no  other  feeling  ever 
has  influence  on  them,  except  accidentally,  and  in  matters 
out  of  the  way  of  business."  I  begin  accordingly  to-night 
low  down  in  the  scale  of  motives ;  but  I  must  know  if  you 
think  me  right  in  doing  so.  Therefore,  let  me  ask  those  who 
admit  the  love  of  praise  to  be  usually  the  strongest  motive 
in  men's  minds  in  seeking  advancement,  and  the  honest 
desire  of  doing  any  kind  of  duty  to  be  an  entirely  secondary 
one,  to  hold  up  their  hands.  (About  a  dozen  of  hands  held 
up — the  audience  partly  not  being  sure  the  lecturer  is  serious, 
and  partly  shy  of  expressing  opinion.)  I  am  quite  serious 
— I  really  do  want  to  know  what  you  think ;  however,  I  can 
judge  by  putting  the  reverse  question.  Will  those  who 
think  that  duty  is  generally  the  first,  and  love  of  praise  the 
second  motive,  hold  up  their  hands  ?  ( One  hand  reported  to 
have  been  held  up^  behind  the  lecturer.)  Very  good :  I  see 
you  are  with  me,  and  that  you  think  I  have  not  begun  too 
near  the  ground.  Now,  without  teasing  you  by  putting 
farther  question,  I  venture  to  assume  that  you  will  admit 


OF   KINGS'   TREASURIES.  11 

duty  as  at  least  a  secondary  or  tertiary  motive.  You  think 
that  the  desire  of  doing  something  useful,  or  obtaining  some 
real  good,  is  indeed  an  existent  collateral  idea,  though  a 
secondary  one,  in  most  men's  desire  of  advancement.  You 
will  grant  that  moderately  honest  men  desire  place  and 
office,  at  least  in  some  measure  for  the  sake  of  their  benefi 
cent  power ;  and  would  wish  to  associate  rather  with  sensi 
ble  and  well-informed  persons  than  with  fools  and  ignorant 
persons,  whether  they  are  seen  in  the  company  of  the  sensi 
ble  ones  or  not.  And  finally,  without  being  troubled  by 
repetition  of  any  common  truisms  about  the  preciousness  of 
friends,  and  the  influence  of  companions,  you  will  admit, 
doubtless,  that  according  to  the  sincerity  of  our  desire  that 
our  friends  may  be  true,  and  our  companions  wise, — and  in 
proportion  to  the  earnestness  and  discretion  with  which  we 
choose  both,  will  be  the  general  chances  of  our  happiness 
and  usefulness. 

But,  granting  that  we  had  both  the  will  and  the  sense  to 
choose  our  friends  well,  how  few  of  us  have  the  power!  or, 
at  least,  how  limited,  for  most,  is  the  sphere  of  choice  ! 
Nearly  all  our  associations  are  determined  by  chance  or 
necessity ;  and  restricted  within  a  narrow  circle.  We  can- 
not  know  whom  we  would ;  and  those  wrhom  we  know,  we 
cannot  have  at  our  side  when  we  most  need  them.  All  the 
higher  circles  of  human  intelligence  are,  to  those  beneath, 


12  SESAME  AND  LILIES. 

only  momentarily  and  partially  open.  "We  may,  by  good 
fortune,  obtain  a  glimpse  of  a  great  poet,  and  hear  the  sound 
of  his  voice ;  or  put  a  question  to  a  man  of  science,  and  be 
answered  good-humouredly.  We  may  intrude  ten  minutes' 
talk  on  a  cabinet  minister,  answered  probably  with  words 
worse  than  silence,  being  deceptive ;  or  snatch,  once  or  twice 
in  our  lives,  the  privilege  of  throwing  a  bouquet  in  the  path 
of  a  Princess,  or  arresting  the  kind  glance  of  a  Queen.  And 
yet  these  momentary  chances  we  covet ;  and  spend  our  years, 
and  passions,  and  powers  in  pursuit  of  little  more  than 
these ;  while,  meantime,  there  is  a  society  continually  open 
to  us,  of  people  who  will  talk  to  us  as  long  as  we  like,  what 
ever  our  rank  or  occupation  ; — talk  to  us  in  the  best  words 
they  can  choose,  and  with  thanks  if  we  listen  to  them.  And 
this  society,  because  it  is  so  numerous  and  so  gentle, — and 
can  be  kept  waiting  round  us  all  day  long,  not  to  grant  audi 
ence,  but  to  gain  it ; — kings  and  statesmen  lingering  patiently 
in  those  plainly  furnished  and  narrow  anterooms,  our  book 
case  shelves, — we  make  no  account  of  that  company, — per 
haps  never  listen  to  a  word  they  would  say,  all  day  long ! 

You  may  tell  me,  perhaps,  or  think  within  yourselves,  that 
the  apathy  with  which  we  regard  this  company  of  the  noble, 
who  are  praying  us  to  listen  to  them,  and  the  passion  with 
which  we  pursue  the  company,  probably  of  the  ignoble,  who 
despise  us,  or  who  have  nothing  to  teach  us,  are  grounded  in 


OF   KINGS'   TREASURIES.  13 

tliis, — that  we  can  see  the  faces  of  the  living  men,  and  it  ia 
themselves,  and  not  their  sayings,  with  which  we  desire  to 
become  familiar.  But  it  is  not  so.  Suppose  you  never  were 
to  see  their  faces ; — suppose  you  could  be  put  behind  a  screen 
in  the  statesman's  cabinet,  or  the  prince's  chamber,  would 
you  not  be  glad  to  listen  to  their  words,  though  you  were 
forbidden  to  advance  beyond  the  screen?  And  when  the 
screen  is  only  a  little  less,  folded  in  two,  instead  of  four,  and 
you  can  be  hidden  behind  the  cover  of  the  two  boards  that 
bind  a  book,  and  listen,  all  day  long,  not  to  the  casual  talk, 
but  to  the  studied,  determined,  chosen  addresses  of  the  wisest 
of  men; — this  station  of  audience,  and  honourable  privy 
council,  you  despise ! 

But  perhaps  you  will  say  that  it  is  because  the  living 
people  talk  of  things  that  are  passing,  and  are  of  immediate 
interest  to  you,  that  you  desire  to  hear  them.  Nay;  that 
cannot  be  so,  for  the  living  people  will  themselves  tell  you 
about  passing  matters,  much  better  in  their  writings  than  in 
their  careless  talk.  But  I  admit  that  this  motive  does  influ 
ence  you,  so  far  as  yon  prefer  those  rapid  and  ephemeral 
writings  to  slow  and  enduring  writings — books,  properly  so 
called.  For  all  books  are  divisible  into  two  classes,  the 
books  of  the  hour,  and  the  books  of  all  time.  Mark  this  dis 
tinction — it  is  not  one  of  quality  only.  It  is  not  merely  the 
bad  book  that  does  not  last,  and  the  good  one  that  does.  It 


14:  SESAME   AND  LILIES. 

is  a  distinction  of  species.  There  are  good  books  for  the 
hour,  and  good  ones  for  all  time ;  bad  books  for  the  hour, 
and  bad  ones  for  all  time.  I  must  define  the  two  kinds 
before  I  go  farther. 

The  good  book  of  the  hour,  then, — I  do  not  speak  of  the 
bad  ones — is  simply  the  useful  or  pleasant  talk  of  some  per 
son  whom  you  cannot  otherwise  converse  with,  printed  for 
you.  Very  useful  often,  telling  you  what  you  need  to  know; 
very  pleasant  often,  as  a  sensible  friend's  present  talk  would 
be.  These  bright  accounts  of  travels;  good-humoured  and 
witty  discussions  of  question ;  lively  or  pathetic  story 
telling  in  the  form  of  novel ;  firm  fact-telling,  by  the  real 
agents  concerned  in  the  events  of  passing  history ; — all  these 
books  of  the  hour,  multiplying  among  us  as  education 
becomes  more  general,  are  a  peculiar  characteristic  and 
possession  of  the  present  age:  we  ought  to  be  entirely 
thankful  for  them,  and  entirely  ashamed  of  ourselves  if  we 
make  no  good  use  of  them.  But  we  make  the  worst  pos 
sible  itse,  if  we  allow  them  to  usurp  the  place  of  true  books : 
for,  strictly  speaking,  they  are  not  books  at  all,  but  merely 
letters  or  newspapers  in  good  print.  Our  friend's  letter 
may  be  delightful,  or  necessary,  to-day :  whether  worth 
keeping  or  not,  is  to  be  considered.  The  newspaper  may 
be  entirely  proper  at  breakfast  time,  bnt  assuredly  it  is  not 
reading  for  all  day.  So,  though  bound  up  in  a  volume,  the 


OF  KINGS'   TKEASURIES.  15 

long  letter  which  gives  you  so  pleasant  an  account  of  the 
inns,  and  roads,  and  weather  last  year  at  such  a  place,  or 
\\hich  tells  you  that  amusing  story,  or  gives  you  the  real 
circumstances  of  such  and  such  events,  however  valuable 
for  occasional  reference,  may  not  be,  in  the  real  sense  of  the 
word,  a  "book"  at  all,  nor,  in  the  real  sense,  to  be  "  read." 
A  book  is  essentially  not  a  talked  thing,  but  a  written  thing ; 
and  written,  not  with  the  view  of  mere  communication,  but 
of  permanence.  The  book  of  talk  is  printed  only  because 
its  author  cannot  speak  to  thousands  of  people  at  once ;  if 
he  could,  he  would — the  volume  is  mere  multiplication  of 
his  voice.  You  cannot  talk  to  your  friend  in  India ;  if  you 
could,  you  would ;  you  write  instead :  that  is  mere  con 
veyance  of  voice.  But  a  book  is  written,  not  to  multiply 
the  voice  merely,  not  to  carry  it  merely,  but  to  preserve  it. 
The  author  has  something  to  say  which  he  perceives  to 
be  true  and  useful,  or  helpfully  beautiful.  So  far  as  he 
knows,  no  one  has  yet  said  it ;  so  far  as  he  knows,  no  one 
else  can  say  it.  He  is  bound  to  say  it,  clearly  and  melo 
diously  if  he  may ;  clearly,  at  all  events.  In  the  sum  of 
his  life  he  finds  this  to  be  the  thing,  or  group  of  things, 
manifest  to  him  ; — this  the  piece  of  true  knowledge,  or  sight, 
which,  his  share  of  sunshine  and  earth  has  permitted  him 
to  seize.  He  would  fain  set  it  down  for  ever;  engrave  it 
on  rock,  if  he  could  ;  saying,  "  This  is  the  best  of  me ;  for 


16  SESAME   AND   LILIES. 

the  rest,  I  ate,  and  drank,  and  slept,  loved,  and  hated,  like 
another ;  my  life  was  as  the  vapour,  and  is  not ;  but  this 
I  saw  and  knew :  this,  if  anything  of  mine,  is  worth  your 
memory."  That  is  his  "  writing ;  "  it  is,  in  his  small  human 
way,  and  with  whatever  degree  of  true  inspiration  is  in  him, 
his  inscription,  or  scripture.  That  is  a  "  Book." 

Perhaps  you  think  no  books  were  ever  so  written  ? 

But,  again,  I  ask  you,  do  you  at  all  believe  in  honesty, 
or  at  all  in  kindness?  or  do  you  think  there  is  never  any 
honesty  or  benevolence  in  wise  people?  None  of  us,  I 
hope,  are  so  unhappy  as  to  think  that.  Well,  whatever  bit 
of  a  wise  man's  work  is  honestly  and  benevolently  done, 
that  bit  is  his  book,  or  his  piece  of  art.  It  is  mixed  always 
with  evil  fragments— ill-done,  redundant,  affected  work. 
But  if  you  read  rightly,  you  will  easily  discover  the  true 
bits,  and  those  are  the  book. 

Now  books  of  this  kind  have  been  written  in  all  ages  by 
their  greatest  men  ; — by  great  leaders,  great  statesmen,  and 
great  thinkers.  These  are  all  at  your  choice  ;  and  life  is 
short.  You  have  heard  as  much  before; — yet  have  you 
measured  and  mapped  out  this  short  life  and  its  possibili 
ties  ?  Do  you  know,  if  you  read  this,  that  you  cannot  read 
that — that  what  you  lose  to-day  you  cannot  gain  to-morrow? 
Will  you  go  and  gossip  with  your  housemaid,  or  your  stable- 
boy,  when  you  may  talk  with  queens  and  kings ;  or  flatter 


17 

yourselves  that  it  is  witlu  any  worthy  consciousness  of  your 
own  claims  to  respect  that  you  jostle  with  the  common 
crowd  for  entree  here,  and  audience  there,  when  all  the 
while  this  eternal  court  is  open  to  you,  with  its  society  wide 
as  the  world,  multitudinous  as  its  days,  the  chosen,  and  the 
mighty,  of  every  place  and  time  ?  Into  that  you  may  enter 
always ;  in  that  you  may  take  fellowship  and  rank  accord 
ing  to  your  wish ;  from  that,  once  entered  into  it,  you  can 
never  be  outcast  but  by  your  own  fault;  by  your  aristocracy 
of  companionship  there,  your  own  inherent  aristocracy  will 
be  assuredly  tested,  and  the  motives  with  which  you  strive 
to  take  high  place  in  the  society  of  the  living,  measured,  as 
to  all  the  truth  and  sincerity  that  are  in  them,  by  the  place 
you  desire  to  take  in  this  company  of  the  Dead. 

"  The  place  you  desire,"  and  the  place  you  fit  yourself 
for,  I  must  also  say;  because,  observe,  this  court  of  the 
past  differs  from  all  living  aristocracy  in  this : — it  is  open  to 
labour  and  to  merit,  but  to  nothing  else.  l$o  wealth  will 
bribe,  no  name  overawe,  no  artifice  deceive,  the  guardian 
of  those  Elysian  gates.  In  the  deep  sense,  no  vile  or  vulgar 
person  ever  enters  there.  At  the  portieres  of  that  silent 
Faubourg  St.  Germain,  there  is  but  brief  question,  "  Do 
you  deserve  to  enter  ?  "  "  Pass.  Do  you  ask  to  be  the 
companion  of  nobles  ?  Make  yourself  noble,  and  you  shall 
be.  Do  you  long  for  the  conversation  of  the  wise  ?  Learn 


18  SESAME  AND   LILIES. 

to  understand  it,  and  you  shall  hear  it.  But  on  other 
terms  ? — no.  If  you  will  not  rise  to  us,  we  cannot  stoop  to 
you.  The  living  lord  may  assume  courtesy,  the  living  philo 
sopher  explain  his  thought  to  you  with  considerable  pain  ; 
but  here  we  neither  feign  nor  interpret ;  you  must  rise  to  the 
level  of  our  thoughts  if  you  would  be  gladdened  by  them, 
and  share  our  feelings,  if  you  would  recognise  our  presence." 

This,  then,  is  what  you  have  to  do,  and  I  admit  that  it 
is  much.  You  must,  in  a  word,  love  these  people,  if  you 
are  to  be  among  them.  No  ambition  is  of  any  use.  They 
scorn  your  ambition.  You  must  love  them,  and  show  your 
love  in  these  two  following  ways. 

I. — First,  by  a  true  desire  to  be  taught  by  them,  and 
to  enter  into  their  thoughts.  To  enter  into  theirs,  observe ; 
not  to  find  your  own  expressed  by  them.  If  the  person 
who  wrote  the  book  is  not  wiser  than  you,  you  need  not 
read  it ;  if  he  be,  he  will  think  differently  from  you  in  many 
respects. 

Very  ready  we  are  to  say  of  a  book,  "  How  good  this  i» — 
that's  exactly  what  I  think !"  But  the  right  feeling  is,  "  How 
strange  that  is !  I  never  thought  of  that  before,  and  yet  I 
see  it  is  true ;  or  if  I  do  not  now,  I  hope  I  shall,  some  day." 
But  whether  thus  submissively  or  not,  at  least  be  sure  that 
you  go  to  the  author  to  get  at  his  meaning,  not  to  find  yours. 
Ju  Ige  it  afterwards,  if  you  think  yourself  qualified  to  do  so  ; 


OF  KINGS'  TREASURIES.  19 

but  ascertain  it  first.  And  be  sure  also,  if  the  author  is  worth 
anything,  that  you  will  not  get  at  his  meaning  all  at  once  ; — 
nay,  that  at  his  whole  meaning  you  will  not  for  a  long  time 
arrive  in  any  wise.  Not  that  he  does  not  say  what  he  means, 
and  in  strong  words  too  ;  but  he  cannot  say  it  all ;  and  what 
is  more  strange,  will  not,  but  in  a  hidden  way  and  in  parables, 
in  order  that  he  may  be  sure  you  want  it.  I  cannot  quite  see 
the  reason  of  this,  nor  analyse  that  cruel  reticence  in  the 
breasts  of  wise  men  which  makes  them  always  hide  their 
deeper  thought.  They  do  not  give  it  you  by  way  of  help, 
but  of  reward,  and  will  make  themselves  sure  that  you 
deserve  it  before  they  allow  you  to  reach  it.  But  it  is  the 
same  with  the  physical  type  of  wisdom,  gold.  There  seems, 
to  you  and  me,  no  reason  why  the  electric  forces  of  the  earth 
should  not  carry  whatever  there  is  of  gold  within  it  at  once 
to  the  mountain  tops,  so  that  kings  and  people  might  know 
that  all  the  gold  they  could  get  was  there  ;  and  without  any 
trouble  of  digging,  or  anxiety,  or  chance,  or  waste  of  time, 
cut  it  away,  and  coin  as  much  as  they  needed.  But  Nature 
does  not  manage  it  so.  She  puts  it  in  little  fissures  in  the 
earth,  nobody  knows  where :  you  may  dig  long  and  find 
none  ;  you  must  dig  painfully  to  find  any. 

And  it  is  just  the  same  with  men's  best  wisdom.  When 
you  come  to  a  good  book,  you  must  ask  yourself,  "  Am  I 
inclined  to  work  as  an  Australian  miner  would  ?  Are  my 


20  SESAME   AND   LILIES. 

pickaxes  and  shovels  in  good  order,  and  am  I  in  good  trim 
myself,  my  sleeves  well  up  to  the  elbow,  and  my  breath  good, 
and  my  temper  ?"  And,  keeping  the  figure  a  little  longer, 
even  at  cost  of  tiresomeness,  for  it  is  a  thoroughly  useful 
one,  the  metal  you  are  in  search  of  being  the  author's  mind 
or  meaning,  his  words  are  as  the  rock  which  you  have  to 
crush  and  smelt  in  order  to  get  at  it.  And  your  pickaxes 
are  your  own  care,  wit,  and  learning ;  your  smelting-furnace 
is  your  own  thoughtful  soul.  Do  not  hope  to  get  at  any 
good  author's  meaning  without  those  tools  and  that  fire ; 
often  you  will  need  sharpest,  finest  chiselling,  and  patientest 
fusing,  before  you  can  gather  one  grain  of  the  metal. 

And,  therefore,  first  of  all,  I  tell  you,  earnestly  and  authori 
tatively,  (I  know  I  am  right  in  this,)  you  must  get  into  the 
habit  of  looking  intensely  at  words,  and  assuring  yourself  oi 
their  meaning,  syllable  by  syllable — nay,  letter  by  letter. 
For  though  it  is  only  by  reason  of  the  opposition  of  letters 
in  the  function  of  signs,  to  sounds  in  function  of  signs,  that 
the  study  of  books  is  called  "  literature,"  and  that  a  man 
versed  in  it  is  called,  by  the  consent  of  nations,  a  man  of 
letters  instead  of  a  man  of  books,  or  of  words,  you  may  yet 
connect  with  that  accidental  nomenclature  this  real  principle : 
— that  you  might  read  all  the  books  in  the  British  Museum 
(if  you  could  live  long  enough),  and  remain  an  utterly  "  illi 
terate,"  uneducated  person ;  but  that  if  you  read  ten  pages 


OF  KINGS'   TREASURIES.  21 

of  a  good  book,  letter  by  letter, — that  is  to  say,  with  real 
accuracy, — you  are  for  evermore  in  some  measure  an  educated 
person.  The  entire  difference  between  education  and  non- 
education  (as  regards  the  merely  intellectual  part  of  it),  con 
sists  in  this  accuracy.  A  well-educated  gentleman  may  not 
know  many  languages, — may  not  be  able  to  speak  any  but  his 
own, — may  have  read  very  few  books.  But  whatever  language 
he  knows,  he  knows  precisely ;  whatever  word  he  pronounces 
he  pronounces  rightly  ;  above  all,  he  is  learned  in  the  peerage 
of  words ;  knows  the  words  of  true  descent  and  ancient 
blood,  at  a  glance,  from  words  of  modern  canaille ;  remem 
bers  all  their  ancestry — their  intermarriages,  distantest  rela 
tionships,  and  the  extent  to  which  they  were  admitted,  and 
offices  they  held,  among  the  national  noblesse  of  words  at 
any  time,  and  in  any  country.  But  an  uneducated  person 
may  know  by  memory  any  number  of  languages,  and  talk 
them  all,  and  yet  truly  know  not  a  word  of  any, — not  a  word 
even  of  his  own.  An  ordinarily  clever  and  sensible  seaman 
will  be  able  to  make  his  way  ashore  at  most  ports ;  yet  ho 
has  only  to  speak  a  sentence  of  any  language  to  be  known 
for  an  illiterate  person :  so  also  the  accent,  or  turn  of  expres 
sion  of  a  single  sentence  will  at  once  mark  a  scholar.  And 
this  is  so  strongly  felt,  so  conclusively  admitted  by  educated 
persons,  that  a  false  accent  or  a  mistaken  syllable  is  enough, 
in  the  parliament  of  any  civilized  nation,  to  assign  to  a  man 


22  SESAME  AND  LILIES. 

a  certain  degree  of  inferior  standing  for  ever.  And  this  is 
right ;  but  it  is  a  pity  that  the  accuracy  insisted  on  is  not 
greater,  and  required  to  a  serious  purpose.  It  is  right  that  a 
false  Latin  quantity  should  excite  a  smile  in  the  House  of 
Commons;  but  it  is  wrong  that  a  false  English  meaning 
should  not  excite  a  frown  there.  Let  the  accent  of  words  be 
watched,  by  all  means,  but  let  their  meaning  be  watched 
more  closely  still,  and  fewer  will  do  the  work.  A  few  words 
well  chosen  and  well  distinguished,  will  do  work  that  a  thou 
sand  cannot,  when  every  one  is  acting,  equivocally,  in  the 
function  of  another.  Yes;  and  words,  if  they  are  not 
watched,  will  do  deadly  work  sometimes.  There  are  masked 
words  droning  and  skulking  about  us  in  Europe  just  now, — 
(there  never  were  so  many,  owing  to  the  spread  of  a  shallow, 
blotching,  blundering,  infectious  "  information,"  or  rather 
deformation,  everywhere,  and  to  the  teaching  of  catechisms 
and  phrases  at  schools  instead  of  human  meanings) — there 
are  masked  words  abroad,  I  say,  which  nobody  understands, 
but  which  everybody  uses,  and  most  people  will  also  fight 
for,  live  for,  or  even  die  for,  fancying  they  mean  this,  or  that, 
or  the  other,  of  things  dear  to  them :  for  such  words  wear 
chameleon  cloaks — "groundlion"  cloaks,  of  the  colour  of  the 
ground  of  any  man's  fancy :  on  that  ground  they  lie  in  wait, 
and  rond  him  with  a  spring  from  it.  There  were  never  crea 
tures  of  prey  so  mischievous,  never  diplomatists  so  cunning, 


OF   KINGS'    TREASURIES.  23 

never  poisoners  so  deadly,  as  these  masked  words ;  they  are 
the  unjust  stewards  of  all  men's  ideas :  whatever  fancy  or 
favourite  instinct  a  man  most  cherishes,  he  gives  to  his  favour 
ite  masked  word  to  take  care  of  for  him;  the  word  at  last 
comes  to  have  an  infinite  power  over  him, — you  cannot  get 
at  him  but  by  its  ministry.  And  in  languages  so  mongrel  in 
breed  as  the  English,  there  is  a  fatal  power  of  equivocation 
put  into  men's  hands,  almost  whether  they  will  or  no,  in 
being  able  to  use  Greek  or  Latin  forms  for  a  word  when  they 
want  it  to  be  respectable,  and  Saxon  or  otherwise  common 
forms  when  they  want  to  discredit  it.  What  a  singular  and 
salutary  effect,  for  instance,  would  be  produced  on  the  minds 
of  people  who  are  in  the  habit  of  taking  the  Form  of  the 
words  they  live  by,  for  the  Power  of  which  those  words  tell 
them,  if  we  always  either  retained,  or  refused,  the  Greek 
form  "  biblos,"  or  "  biblion,"  as  the  right  expression  for 
"  book  " — instead  of  employing  it  only  in  the  one  instance  in 
which  we  wish  to  give  dignity  to  the  idea,  and  translating  it 
everywhere  else.  How  wholesome  it  would  be  for  the  many 
simple  persons  who  worship  the  Letter  of  God's  Word 
instead  of  its  Spirit,  (just  as  other  idolaters  worship  His  pic 
ture  instead  of  His  presence,)  if,  in  such  places  (for  instance; 
as  Acts  xix.  19  we  retained  the  Greek  expression,  instead  of 
translating  it,  and  they  had  to  read — "  Many  of  them  also 
which  used  curious  arts,  brought  their  bibles  together,  and 


24  SESAME   AKD  LILIES. 

burnt  them  before  all  men ;  and  they  counted  the  price  of 
them,  and  found  it  fifty  thousand  pieces  of  silver !  "  Or  if, 
on  the  other  hand,  we  translated  instead  of  retaining  it,  and 
always  spoke  of  "  the  Holy  Book,"  instead  of  "  Holy  Bible," 
it  might  come  into  more  heads  than  it  does  at  present  that 
the  Word  of  God,  by  which  the  heavens  were,  of  old,  and 
by  which  they  are  now  kept  in  store,*  cannot  be  made  a 
present  of  to  anybody  in  morocco  binding  ;  nor  sown  on  any 
wayside  by  help  either  of  steam  plough  or  steam  press  ;  but 
is  nevertheless  being  offered  to  us  daily,  and  by  us  with  con 
tumely  refused  ;  and  sown  in  us  daily,  and  by  us  as  instantly 
as  may  be,  choked. 

So,  again,  consider  what  effect  has  been  produced  on  the 
English  vulgar  mind  by  the  use  of  the  sonorous  Latin  form 
"damno,"  in  translating  the  Greek  xaraxp/vw,  when  people 
charitably  wish  to  make  it  forcible  ;  and  the  substitution  of 
the  temperate  "  condemn"  for  it,  when  they  choose  to  keep 
it  gentle.  And  what  notable  sermons  have  been  preached 
by  illiterate  clergymen  on — "  He  that  believeth  not  shall  be 
damned  ; "  though  they  would  shrink  with  horror  from  trans- 
lating  Heb.  xi.  7,  "The  saving  of  his  house,  by  which  he 
damned  the  world,"  or  John  viii.  12,  "Woman,  hath  no  man 
damned  thee  ?  She  saith,  No  man,  Lord.  Jesus  answered 
her,  Neither  do  I  damn  thee;  go  and  sin  no  more."  And 
*  2  Peter  iii.  5—7. 


OF   KINGS'  TREASURIES.  25 

divisions  in  the  mind  of  Europe,  which  have  cost  seas  of 
blood,  and  in  the  defence  of  which  the  noblest  souls'  of  men 
have  been  cast  away  in  frantic  desolation,  countless  as  forest 
leaves — though,  in  the  heart  of  them,  founded  on  deeper 
causes — have  nevertheless  been  rendered  practicably  possi 
ble,  mainly,  by  the  European  adoption  of  the  Greek  word 
for  a  public  meeting,  to  give  peculiar  respectability  to  such 
meetings,  when  held  for  religious  purposes ;  and  other  colla 
teral  equivocations,  such  as  the  vulgar  English  one  of  using 
the  word  "  priest "  as  a  contraction  for  "  presbyter." 

Now,  in  order  to  deal  with  words  rightly,  this  is  the  habit 
you  must  form.  Nearly  every  word  in  your  language  has 
been  first  a  word  of  some  other  language — of  Saxon,  German, 
French,  Latin,  or  Greek ;  (not  to  speak  of  eastern  and  primi 
tive  dialects.)  And  many  words  have  been  all  these ; — that 
is  to  say,  have  been  Greek  first,  Latin  next,  French  or  Ger 
man  next,  and  English  last :  undergoing  a  certain  change 
of  sense  and  use  on  the  lips  of  each  nation ;  but  retaining  a 
deep  vital  meaning  which  all  good  scholars  feel  in  employing 
them,  even  at  this  day.  If  you  do  not  know  the  Greek 
alphabet,  learn  it ;  young  or  old — girl  or  boy — whoever  you 
may  be,  if  you  think  of  reading  seriously  (which,  of  course, 
implies  that  you  have  some  leisure  at  command),  learn  your 
Greek  alphabet ;  then  get  good  dictionaries  of  all  these 

languages,  and  whenever  you  are  in  doubt  about  a  word, 

2 


26  SESAME   AND   LILIES. 

hunt  it  down  patiently.  Read  Max  Muller's  lectures  tho 
roughly,1  to  begin  with ;  and,  after  that,  never  let  a  word 
escape  you  that  looks  suspicious.  It  is  severe  work ;  but 
you  will  find  it,  even  at  first,  interesting,  and  at  last,  end 
lessly  amusing.  And  the  general  gain  to  your  character,  in 
power  and  precision,  will  be  quite  incalculable. 

Mind,  this  does  not  imply  knowing,  or  trying  to  know, 
Greek,  or  Latin,  or  French.  It  takes  a  whole  life  to  learn 
any  language  perfectly.  But  you  can  easily  ascertain  the 
meanings  through  which  the  English  word  has  passed ;  and 
those  which  in  a  good  writer's  work  it  must  still  bear. 

And  now,  merely  for  example's  sake,  I  will,  with  your 
permission,  read  a  few  lines  of  a  true  book  with  you,  care 
fully  ;  and  see  what  will  come  out  of  them.  I  will  take  a 
book  perfectly  known  to  you  all ;  No  English  words  are  more 
familiar  to  us,  yet  nothing  perhaps  has  been  less  read  with 
sincerity.  I  will  take  these  few  following  lines  of  Lycidas. 

''Last  came,  and  last  did  go, 

The  pilot  of  the  Galilean  lake ; 

Two  massy  keys  he  bore  of  metals  twain, 

(The  golden  opes,  the  iron  shuts  amain), 

He  shook  his  mitred  locks,  and  stern  bespake, 

How  well  could  I  have  spar'd  for  thee,  young  swain, 

Enow  of  such  as  for  their  bellies'  sake 

Creep  and  intrude,  and  climb  into  the  fold  I 


OF   KINGS'   TREASURIES.  27 

Of  other  care  they  little  reckoning  make, 

Than  how  to  scramble  at  the  shearers'  feast, 

And  shove  away  the  worthy  bidden  guest ; 

Blind  mouths!  that  scarce  themselves  know  how  to  hold 

A  sheep-hook,  or  have  learn'd  aught  else,  the  least 

That  to  the  faithful  herdsman's  art  belongs! 

What  recks  it  them  ?  What  need  they  ?  They  are  sped ; 

And  when  they  list,  their  lean  and  flashy  songs 

Grate  on  their  scrannel  pipes  of  wretched  straw; 

The  hungry  sheep  look  up,  and  are  not  fed, 

But  swoln  with  wind,  and  the  rank  mist  they  draw, 

Rot  inwardly,  and  foul  contagion  spread ; 

Besides  what  the  grim  wolf  with  privy  paw 

Daily  devours  apace,  and  nothing  said." 

Let  us  think  over  this  passage,  and  examine  its  words. 

First,  is  it  not  singular  to  find  Milton  assigning  to  St. 
Peter,  not  only  his  full  episcopal  function,  but  the  very  types 
of  it  which  Protestants  usually  refuse  most  passionately  ? 
His  "  mitred "  locks !  Milton  was  no  Bishop-lover ;  how 
comes  St.  Peter  to  be  "mitred?"  "Two  massy  keys  ho 
bore."  Is  this,  then,  the  power  of  the  keys  claimed  by  the 
Bishops  of  Rome,  and  is  it  acknowledged  here  by  Milton 
only  in  a  poetical  licence,  for  the  sake  of  its  picturesqueness, 
that  he  may  get  the  gleam  of  the  golden  keys  to  help  his 
effect?  Do  not  think  it.  Great  men  do  not  play  stage 
tricks  with  doctrines  of  life  and  death :  only  little  men  do 


28  SESAME  AND  LILIES. 

that.  Milton  means  what  he  says;  and  means  it  with  hi3 
might  too — is  going  to  put  the  whole  strength  of  his  spirit 
presently  into  the  saying  of  it.  For  though  not  a  lover  of 
lalse  bishops,  he  was  a  lover  of  true  ones ;  and  the  Lake- 
pilot  is  here,  in  his  thoughts,  the  type  and  head  of  true  epis 
copal  power.  For  Milton  reads  that  text,  "  I  will  give  unto 
thee  the  keys  of  the  kingdom  of  Heaven "  quite  honestly. 
Puritan  though  he  be,  he  would  not  blot  it  out  of  the  book 
because  there  have  been  bad  bishops ;  nay,  in  order  to  under 
stand  him,  we  must  understand  that  verse  first ;  it  will  not 
do  to  eye  it  askance,  or  whisper  it  under  our  breath,  as  if  it 
were  a  weapon  of  an  adverse  sect.  It  is  a  solemn,  univer 
sal  assertion,  deeply  to  be  kept  in  mind  by  all  sects.  But 
perhaps  we  shall  be  better  able  to  reason  on  it  if  we  go  on  a 
little  farther,  and  come  back  to  it.  For  clearly,  this  marked 
insistance  on  the  power  of  the  true  episcopate  is  to  make  us 
feel  more  weightily  what  is  to  be  charged  against  the  false 
claimants  of  episcopate  ;  or  generally,  against  false  claimants 
of  power  and  rank  in  the  body  of  the  clergy ;  they  who,  "  for 
their  bellies'  sake,  creep,  and  intrude,  and  climb  into  the 
fold." 

Do  not  think  Milton  uses  those  three  words  to  fill  up  his 
verse,  as  a  loose  writer  would.  He  needs  all  the  three ; 
specially  those  three,  and  no  more  than  those — "  creep,"  and 
"  intrude,"  and  "  climb ;"  no  other  words  would  or  could 


29 

gerve  the  turn,  and  no  more  could  be  added.  For  they 
exhaustively  comprehend  the  three  classes,  correspondent  to 
the  three  characters,  of  men  who  dishonestly  seek  ecclesiasti 
cal  power.  First,  those  who  "  creep"  into  the  fold ;  who  do 
not  care  for  office,  nor  name,  but  for  secret  influence,  and  do 
all  things  occultly  and  cunningly,  consenting  to  any  servility 
of  office  or  conduct,  so  only  that  they  may  intimately  discern, 
and  unawares  direct,  the  minds  of  men.  Then  those  who 
"intrude"  (thrust,  that  is)  themselves  into  the  fold,  who  by 
natural  insolence  of  heart,  and  stout  eloquence  of  tongue, 
and  fearlessly  perseverant  self-assertion,  obtain  hearing  and 
authority  with  the  common  crowd.  Lastly,  those  who 
"  climb,"  who,  by  labour  and  learning,  both  stout  and  sound, 
but  selfishly  exerted  in  the  cause  of  their  own  ambition,  gain 
high  dignities  and  authorities,  and  become  "  lords  over  the 
heritage,"  though  not  "  ensamples  to  the  flock." 
Now  go  on : — 

"  Of  other  care  they  little  reckoning  make, 
Than  how  to. scramble  at  the  shearers'  feast 
Blind  mouths—" 

I  pause  again,,  for  this  is  a  strange  expression ;  a  broken 
metaphor,  one  might  think,  careless  and  unscholarly. 

Not  so :  its  very  audacity  and  pithiness  are  intended  to 


80  SESAME   AND   LILIES. 

make  us  look  close  at  the  phrase  and  remember  it.  Those 
two  monosyllables  express  the  precisely  accurate  contraries 
of  right  character,  in  the  two  great  offices  of  the  Church — 
those  of  bishop  and  pastor. 

A  Bishop  means  a  person  who  sees. 

A  Pastor  means  one  who  feeds. 

The  most  unbishoply  character  a  man  can  have  is  therefore 
to  be  Blind. 

The  most  unpastoral  is,  instead  of  feeding,  to  want  to  be 
fed, — to  be  a  Mouth. 

Take  the  two  reverses  together,  and  you  have  "blind 
mouths."  We  may  advisably  follow  out  this  idea  a  little. 
Nearly  all  the  evils  in  the  Church  have  arisen  from  bishops 
desiring  power  more  than  light.  They  want  authority,  not 
outlook.  Whereas  their  real  office  is  not  to  rule  ;  though  it 
may  be  vigorously  to  exhort  and  rebuke;  it  is  the  king's 
office  to  rule ;  the  bishop's  office  is  to  oversee  the  flock ;  to 
number  it,  sheep  by  sheep ;  to  be  ready  always  to  give  full 
account  of  it.  Now  it  is  clear  he  cannot  give  account  of  the 
souls,  if  he  has  rot  so  much  as  numbered  the  bodies  of  his 
flock.  The  first  thing,  therefore,  that  a  bishop  has  to  do  is 
at  least  to  put  himself  in  a  position  in  which,  at  any  moment, 
he  can  obtain  the  history  from  childhood  of  every  living  soul 
in  his  diocese,  and  of  its  present  state.  Down  in  that  back 
street,  Bill,  and  Nancy,  knocking  each  other's  teeth  out  1— 


OF  KINGS'  TREASURIES.  31 

Does  the  bishop  know  all  about  it?  Has  he  his  eye  upon 
them  ?  Has  he  had  his  eye  upon  them  ?  Can  he  circum 
stantially  explain  to  us  how  Bill  got  into  the  habit  of  beating 
Nancy  about  the  head  ?  If  he  cannot,  he  is  no  bishop, 
though  he  had  a  mitre  as  high  as  Salisbury  steeple ;  he  is  no 
bishop, — he  has  sought  to  be  at  the  helm  instead  of  the 
masthead  ;  he  has  no  sight  of  things.  "  Nay,"  you  say,  it  is 
not  his  duty  to  look  after  Bill  hi  the  back  street.  What ! 
the  fat  sheep  that  have  full  fleeces — you  think  it  is  only  those 
he  should  look  after,  while  (go  back  to  your  Milton)  "  the 
hungry  sheep  look  up,  and  are  not  fed,  besides  what  the  grim 
wolf,  with  privy  paw"  (bishops  knowing  nothing  about  it) 
"  daily  devours  apace,  and  nothing  said  ?  " 

"  But  that's  not  our  idea  of  a  bishop."  Perhaps  not ;  but 
it  was  St.  Paul's ;  and  it  was  Milton's.  They  may  be  right, 
or  we  may  be  ;  but  we  must  not  think  we  are  reading  either 
one  or  the  other  by  putting  our  meaning  into  their  words. 

I  go  on. 

"  But,  swollen  with  wind,  and  the  rank  mist  they  draw." 

This  is  to  meet  the  vulgar  answer  that  "if  the  poor  are  not 
looked  after  in  their  bodies,  they  are  in  their  souls ;  they 
have  spiritual  food." 

And  Milton  says,  "They  have  no  such  thing  as  spiritual 


32  SESAME   AND   LILIES. 

food ;  tney  are  only  swollen  with  wind."  At  first  you  may 
think  that  is  a  coarse  type,  and  an  obscure  one.  But  again, 
it  is  a  quite  literally  accurate  one.  Take  up  your  Latin  and 
Greek  dictionaries,  and  find  out  the  meaning  of  "  Spirit." 
It  is  only  a  contraction  of  the  Latin  word  "  breath,"  and  an 
indistinct  translation  of  the  Greek  word  for  "  wind."  The 
same  word  is  used  in  writing,  "The  wind  bloweth  where  it 
listeth  ;"  and  in  writing,  "  So  is  every  one  that  is  born  of  the 
Spirit ;"  born  of  the  breath,  that  is  ;  for  it  means  the  breath 
of  God,  in  soul  and  body.  We  have  the  true  sense  of  it  in 
our  words  "  inspiration"  and  "  expire."  Now,  there  are  two 
kinds  of  breath  with  which  the  flock  may  be  filled ;  God's 
breath,  and  man's.  The  breath  of  God  is  health,  and  life, 
and  peace  to  them,  as  the  air  of  heaven  is  to  the  flocks  on 
the  hills;  but  man's  breath — the  word  which  he  calls 
spiritual, — is  disease  and  contagion  to  them,  as  the  fog  of  the 
fen.  They  rot  inwardly  with  it ;  they  are  puffed  up  by  it,  as 
a  dead  body  by  the  vapours  of  its  own  decomposition.  This 
is  literally  true  of  all  false  religious  teaching ;  the  first,  and 
last,  and  fatalest  sign  of  it  is  that  "  puffing  up."  Your  con 
verted  children,  who  teach  their  parents ;  your  converted 
convicts,  who  teach  honest  men ;  your  converted  dunces, 
who,  having  lived  in  cretinous  stupefaction  half  their  lives, 
suddenly  awaking  to  the  fact  of  there  being  a  God,  fancy 
themselves  therefore  His  peculiar  people  and  messengers; 


33 

your  sectarians  of  every  species,  small  and  great,  Catholic  or 
Protestant,  of  high  church  or  low,  in  so  far  as  they  think 
themselves  exclusively  in  the  right  and  others  wrong;  and 
pre-eminently,  in  every  sect,  those  who  hold  that  men  can  be 
saved  by  thinking  rightly  instead  of  doing  rightly,  by  word 
instead  of  act,  and  wish  instead  of  work  : — these  are  the  true 
fog  children — clouds,  these,  without  water;  bodies,  these, 
of  putrescent  vapour  and  skin,  without  blood  or  flesh  :  blown 
bag-pipes  for  the  fiends  to  pipe  with — corrupt,  and  corrupt 
ing, — "  Swollen  with  wind,  and  the  rank  mist  they  draw." 

Lastly,  let  us  return  to  the  lines  respecting  the  power  of 
the  keys,  for  now  we  can  understand  them.  Note  the  differ 
ence  between  Milton  and  Dante  in  their  interpretation  of  this 
power :  for  once,  the  latter  is  weaker  in  thought ;  he  sup 
poses  both  the  keys  to  be  of  the  gate  of  heaven ;  one  is  of 
gold,  the  other  of  silver :  they  are  given  by  St.  Peter  to  the 
sentinel  angel ;  and  it  is  not  easy  to  determine  the  meaning 
either  of  the  substances  of  the  three  steps  of  the  gate,  or  of 
the  two  keys.  But  Milton  makes  one,  of  gold,  the  key  of 
heaven ;  the  other,  of  iron,  the  key  of  the  prison,  in  which 
the  wicked  teachers  are  to  be  bound  who  u  have  taken  away 
the  key  of  knowledge,  yet  entered  not  in  themselves." 

We  have  seen  that  the  duties  of  bishop  and  pastor  are  to 
see,  and  feed ;  and,  of  all  who  do  so,  it  is  said,  "  He  that 

watereth,  shall  be  watered  also  himself."     But  the  reverse  ia 

2* 


34  SESAME  AND   LILIES. 

truth  also.  He  that  watereth  not,  shall  be  withered  himself, 
and  he  that  seeth  Dot,  shall  himself  be  shut  out  of  sight, — 
shut  into  the  perpetual  prison-house.  And  that  prison  opens 
here,  as  well  as  hereafter :  he  who  is  to  be  bound  in  heaven 
must  first  be  bound  on  earth.  That  command  to  the  strong 
angels,  of  which  the  rock-apostle  is  the  image,  "  Take  him, 
and  bind  him  hand  and  foot,  and  cast  him  out,"  issues,  in  its 
measure,  against  the  teacher,  for  every  help  withheld,  and  for 
every  truth  refused,  and  for  every  falsehood  enforced  ;  so 
that  he  is  more  strictly  fettered  the  more  he  fetters,  and 
farther  outcast,  as  he  more  and  more  misleads,  till  at  last  the 
bars  of  the  iron  cage  close  upon  him,  and  as  "  the  golden 
opes,  the  iron  shuts  amain." 

We  have  got  something  out  of  the  lines,  I  think,  and  much 
more  is  yet  to  be  found  in  them  ;  but  we  have  done  enough 
by  way  of  example  of  the  kind  of  word-by-word  examina 
tion  of  your  author  which  is  rightly  called  "reading;" 
watching  every  accent  and  expression,  and  putting  ourselves 
always  in  the  author's  place,  annihilating  our  own  person 
ality,  and  seeking  to  enter  into  his,  so  as  to  be  able  assuredly 
to  say,  "  Thus  Milton  thought,"  not  "  Thus  I  thought,  in 
mis-reading  Milton."  And  by  this  process  you  will  gradually 
come  to  attach  less  weight  to  your  own  "  Thus  I  thought"  at 
other  times.  You  will  begin  to  perceive  that  what  you 
thought  was  a  matter  of  no  serious  importance ; — that  your 


OF   KINGS7  TREASURIES.  35 

thoughts  on  any  subject  are  not  perhaps  the  clearest  and 
wisest  that  could  be  arrived  at  thereupon : — in  fact,  that 
unless  you  are  a  very  singular  person,  you  cannot  be  said  to 
have  any  "  thoughts"  at  all ;  that  you  have  no  materials  for 
them,  in  any  serious  matters; — no  right  to  "think,"  but  only 
to  try  to  learn  more  of  the  facts.  Nay,  most  probably  all 
your  life  (unless,  as  I  said,  you  are  a  singular  person)  you 
will  have  no  legitimate  right  to  an  "  opinion"  on  any  busi 
ness,  except  that  instantly  under  your  hand.  What  must  of 
necessity  be  done,  you  can  always  find  out,  beyond  question, 
how  to  do.  Have  you  a  house  to  keep  in  order,  a  commo 
dity  to  sell,  a  field  to  plough,  a  ditch  to  cleanse?  There 
need  be  no  two  opinions  about  these  proceedings ;  it  is  at 
your  peril  if  you  have  not  much  more  than  an  "  opinion"  on 
the  way  to  manage  such  matters.  And  also,  outside  of  your 
own  business,  there  are  one  or  two  subjects  on  which  you 
are  bound  to  have  but  one  opinion.  That  roguery  and  lying 
are  objectionable,  and  are  instantly  to  be  flogged  out  of  the 
way  whenever  discovered ; — that  covetousness  and  love  of 
quarrelling  are  dangerous  dispositions  even  in  children,  and 
deadly  dispositions  in  men  and  nations ; — that  in  the  end,  the 
God  of  heaven  and  earth  loves  active,  modest,  and  kind 
people,  and  hates  idle,  proud,  greedy,  and  cruel  ones ; — on 
these  general  facts  you  are  bound  to  have  but  one,  and  that 
a  very  strong,  opinion.  For  the  rest,  respecting  religions, 


36  SESAME  AND  LILIES. 

governments,  sciences,  arts,  you  will  find  that,  on  the  whole, 
you  can  know  NOTHING, — judge  nothing ;  that  the  best  you 
can  do,  even  though  you  may  be  a  well-educated  person,  is 
to  be  silent,  and  strive  to  be  wiser  every  day,  and  to  under 
stand  a  little  more  of  the  thoughts  of  others,  which  so  soon 
as  you  try  to  do  honestly,  you  will  discover  that  the 
thoughts  even  of  the  wisest  are  very  little  more  than  perti 
nent  questions.  To  put  the  difficulty  into  a  clear  shape,  and 
exhibit  to  you  the  grounds  for  tndecuion,  that  is  all  they  can 
generally  do  for  you! — and  well  for  them  and  for  us,  if 
indeed  they  are  able  "  to  mix  the  music  with  our  thoughts, 
and  sadden  us  with  heavenly  doubts."  This  writer,  from 
whom  I  have  been  reading  to  you,  is  not  among  the  first  or 
wisest :  he  sees  shrewdly  as  far  as  he  sees,  and  therefore  it  is 
easy  to  find  out  his  full  meaning,  but  with  the  greater  men, 
you  cannot  fathom  their  meaning ;  they  do  not  even  wholly 
measure  it  themselves, — it  is  so  wide.  Suppose  I  had  asked 
you,  for  instance,  to  seek  for  Shakespeare's  opinion,  instead 
of  Milton's,  on  this  matter  of  Church  authority  ? — or  for 
Dante's  ?  Have  any  of  you,  at  this  instant,  the  least  idea 
what  either  thought  about  it  ?  Have  you  ever  balanced  the 
scene  with  the  bishops  in  Richard  III.  against  the  character 
of  Cranmer  ?  the  description  of  St.  Francis  and  St.  Dominic 
against  that  of  him  who  made  Virgil  wonder  to  gaze  upon 
him, — "  disteso,  tanto  vilmente,  nell'  eterno  esilio  ;"  or  of 


OF  KINGS'   TREASURIES.  37 

iimi  whom  Dante  stood  beside,  "  come  '1  frate  che  coiifessa 
lo  perfido  assassin  ?  "*  Shakespeare  and  Alighieri  knew  men 
better  than  most  of  us,  I  presume  !  They  were  both  in  the 
midst  of  the  main  struggle  between  the  temporal  and  spiri 
tual  powers.  They  had  an  opinion,  we  may  guess?  But 
where  is  it?  Bring  it  into  court!  Put  Shakespeare's  or 
Dante's  creed  into  articles,  and  se/id  that  up  into  the  Eccle 
siastical  Courts  ! 

You  will  not  be  able,  I  tell  you  again,  for  many  and 
many  a  day,  to  come  at  the  real  purposes  and  teaching 
of  these  great  men  ;  but  a  very  little  honest  study  of  them 
will  enable  you  to  perceive  that  what  you  took  for  your  own 
"judgment"  was  mere  chance  prejudice,  and  drifted,  help 
less,  entangled  weed  of  castaway  thought :  nay,  you  will  see 
that  most  men's  minds  are  indeed  little  better  than  rough 
heath  wilderness,  neglected  and  stubborn,  partly  barren, 
partly  overgrown  with  pestilent  brakes  and  venomous  wind- 
sown  herbage  of  evil  surmise ;  that  the  first  thing  you  have 
to  do  for  them,  and  yourself,  is  eagerly  and  scornfully  to  set 
fire  to  this ;  burn  all  the  jungle  into  wholesome  ash-heaps, 
and  then  plough  and  sow.  All  the  true  literary  work  before 
you,  for  life,  must  begin  with  obedience  to  that  order, 
" Bre*»k  up  your  fallow  ground,  and  sow  not  among  thorns" 

II.  Having  then  faithfully  listened  to  the  great  teachers, 
*  Inf.  xix.  71;  rxiii.  117. 


88  SESAME    A.ND  LILIES. 

that  you  may  enter  into  their  Thoughts,  you  have  yet  this 
higher  advance  to  make; — you  have  to  enter  into  their 
Hearts.  As  you  go  to  them  first  for  clear  sight,  so  you  must 
stay  with  them  that  you  may  share  at  last  their  just  and 
mighty  Passion.  Passion,  or  "  sensation."  I  am  not  afraid 
of  the  word ;  still  less  of  the  thing.  You  hare  heard  many 
outcries  against  sensation  lately ;  but,  I  can  tell  you,  it  is 
not  less  sensation  we  want,  but  more.  The  ennobling  dif 
ference  between  one  man  and  another, — between  one  animal 
and  another, — is  precisely  in  this,  that  one  feels  more  than 
another.  If  we  were  sponges,  perhaps  sensation  might  not 
be  easily  got  for  us ;  if  we  were  earth-worms,  liable  at  every 
instant  to  be  cut  in  two  by  the  spade,  perhaps  too  much 
sensation  might  not  be  good  for  us.  But,  being  human  crea 
tures,  it  is  good  for  us;  nay,  we  are  only  human  in  so  far  as 
we  are  sensitive,  and  our  honour  is  precisely  in  proportion 
to  our  passion. 

You  know  I  said  of  that  great  and  pure  society  of  the 
dead,  that  it  would  allow  "  no  vain  or  vulgar  person  to  entei 
there."  What  do  you  think  I  meant  by  a  "  vulgar"  person  ? 
What  do  you  yourselves  mean  by  "  vulgarity  ?"  You  will 
find  it  a  fruitful  subject  of  thought ;  but,  briefly,  the  essence 
of  all  vulgarity  lies  in  want  of  sensation.  Simple  and  inno 
cent  vulgarity  is  merely  an  untrained  and  undeveloped  blunt- 
of  body  and  mind ;  but  in  true  inbred  vulgarity,  there 


OF   KINGS'   TREASURIES.  39 

is  a  deathful  callousness,  which,  in  extremity,  becomes  capa 
ble  of  every  sort  of  bestial  habit  and  crime,  without  fear, 
without  pleasure,  without  horror,  and  without  pity.  It  is 
in  the  blunt  hand  and  the  dead  heart,  in  the  diseased  habit, 
in  the  hardened  conscience,  that  men  become  vulgar ;  they 
are  for  ever  vulgar,  precisely  in  proportion  as  they  are 
incapable  of  sympathy, — of  quick  understanding, — of  all 
that,  in  deep  insistence  on  the  common,  but  most  accurate 
term,  may  be  called  the  "tact"  or  touch-faculty  of  body  and 
soul :  that  tact  which  the  Mimosa  has  in  trees,  which  the 
pure  woman  has  above  all  creatures ; — fineness  and  fulness 
of  sensation,  beyond  reason ; — the  guide  and  sanctifier  of 
reason  itself.  Reason  can  but  determine  what  is  true: — it 
is  the  God-given  passion  of  humanity  which  alone  can  recog 
nise  what  God  has  made  good. 

We  come  then  to  that  great  concourse  of  the  Dead,  not 
merely  to  know  from  them  what  is  True,  but  chiefly  to  feel 
with  them  what  is  Righteous.  ISTow,  to  feel  with  them,  we 
must  be  like  them  ;  and  none  of  us  can  become  that  without 
pains.  As  the  true  knowledge  is  disciplined  and  tested  know 
ledge, — not  the  first  thought  that  comes, — so  the  true  passion 
is  disciplined  and  tested  passion — not  the  first  passion  that 
comes.  The  first  that  come  are  the  vain,  the  false,  the  treache 
rous;  if  you  yield  to  them  they  will  lead  you  wildly  and  fai, 
in  vain  pursuit,  in  hollow  enthusiasm,  till  you  have  no  true 


40  SESAME   AND   LILIES. 

purpose  and  no  true  passion  left.  Not  that  any  feeling  pos 
sible  to  humanity  is  in  itself  wrong,  but  only  wrong  when 
undisciplined.  Its  nobility  is  in  its  force  and  justice;  it  is 
wrong  when  it  is  weak,  and  felt  for  paltry  cause.  There  is 
a  mean  wonder  as  of  a  child  who  sees  a  juggler  tossing 
golden  balls,  and  this  is  base,  if  you  will.  But  do  you  think 
that  the  wonder  is  ignoble,  or  the  sensation  less,  with  which 
every  human  soul  is  called  to  watch  the  golden  balls  of 
heaven  tossed  through  the  night  by  the  Hand  that  made 
them?  There  is  a  mean  curiosity,  as  of  a  child  opening  a 
forbidden  door,  or  a  servant  prying  into  her  master's  busi 
ness; — and  a  noble  curiosity,  questioning,  in  the  front  of 
danger,  the  source  of  the  great  river  beyond  the  sand — the 
place  of  the  great  continents  beyond  the  sea ; — a  nobler 
curiosity  still,  which  questions  of  the  source  of  the  River  of 
Life,  and  of  the  space  of  the  Continent  of  Heaven, — things 
which  "the  angels  desire  to  look  into."  So  the  anxiety  is 
ignoble,  with  which  you  linger  over  the  course  and  cata 
strophe  of  an  idle  tale ;  but  do  you  think  the  anxiety  is  less, 
or  greater,  with  which  you  watch,  or  ought  to  watch,  the 
dealings  of  fate  and  destiny  with  the  life  of  an  agonised 
nation  ?  Alas  !  it  is  the  narrowness,  selfishness,  minuteness, 
of  your  sensation  that  you  have  to  deplore  in  England  at 
this  day ; — sensation  which  spends  itself  in  bouquets  and 
speeches;  in  revellings  and  junketings;  in  sham  fights  and 


41 

gay  puppet  shows,  while  you  can  look  on  and  see  noble 
nations  murdered,  man  by  man,  woman  by  woman,  child  by 
child,  without  an  effort,  or  a  tear. 

I  said  "minuteness"  and  "selfishness"  of  sensation,  but 
in  a  word,  I  ought  to  have  said  "injustice"  or  " unrighteous 
ness  "  of  sensation.  For  as  in  nothing  is  a  gentleman  better 
to  be  discerned  from  a  vulgar  person,  so  in  nothing  is 
a  gentle  nation  (such  nations  have  been)  better  to  be 
discerned  from  a  mob,  than  in  this, — that  their  feelings 
are  constant  and  just,  results  of  due  contemplation,  and 
of  equal  thought.  You  can  talk  a  mob  into  anything; 
its  feelings  may  be — usually  are — on  the  whole  generous 
and  right ;  but  it  has  no  foundation  for  them,  no  hold 
of  them;  you  may  tease  or  tickle  it  into  any,  at  your 
pleasure  ;  it  thinks  by  infection,  for  the  most  part,  catching 
a  passion  like  a  cold,  and  there  is  nothing  so  little  that  it 
will  not  roar  itself  wild  about,  when  the  fit  is  on ; — 
nothing  so  great  but  it  will  forget  in  an  hour,  when 
the  fit  is  past.  But  a  gentleman's,  or  a  gentle  nation's, 
passions  are  just,  measured,  and  continuous.  A  great 
nation,  for  instance,  does  not  spend  its  entire  national 
wits  for  a  couple  of  months  in  weighing  evidence  of  a 
single  ruffian's  having  done  a  single  murder;  and  for  a 
couple  of  years,  see  its  own  children  murder  each  other 
by  their  thousands  or  tens  of  thousands  a  day,  consider- 


4:2  SESAME   AND   LILIES. 

ing  only  what  the  effect  is  likely  to  be  on  the  price 
of  cotton,  and  caring  nowise  to  determine  which  side 
of  battle  is  in  the  wrong.  Neither  does  a  great  nation 
send  its  poor  little  boys  to  jail  for  stealing  six  walnuts; 
and  allow  its  bankrupts  to  steal  their  hundreds  of 
thousands  with  a  bow,  and  its  bankers,  rich  with  poor 
men's  savings,  to  close  their  doors  "  under  circumstances 
over  which  they  have  no  control,"  with  a  "  by  your  leave ; " 
and  large  landed  estates  to  be  bought  by  men  who  have 
made  their  money  by  going  with  armed  steamers  up  and 
down  the  China  Seas,  selling  opium  at  the  cannon's  mouth, 
and  altering,  for  the  benefit  of  the  foreign  nation,  the  com 
mon  highwayman's  demand  of  "  your  money  or  your  life," 
into  that  of  "  your  money  and  your  life."  Neither  does  a 
great  nation  allow  the  lives  of  its  innocent  poor  to  be 
parched  out  of  them  by  fog  fever,  and  rotted  out  of  them 
by  dunghill  plague,  for  the  sake  of  sixpence  a  life  extra 
per  week  to  its  landlords  ;*  and  then  debate,  with  drivelling 

*  See  the  evidence  in  the  Medical  officer's  report  to  the  Privy  Council, 
just  published.  There  are  suggestions  in  its  preface  which  will  make 
Borne  stir  among  us,  I  fancy,  respecting  which  let  me  note  these  points 
Allowing: — 

There  are  two  theories  on  the  subject  of  land  now  abroad,  and  in  couteii 

3n ;  both  false. 

the  first  is  that  by  Heavenly  law,  there  have  always  existed,  and  must 


or  KINGS'  TREASURIES.  48 

tears,  and  diabolical  sympathies,  whether  it  ought  not 
piously  to  save,  and  nursingly  cherish,  the  lives  of  its 

continue  to  exist,  a  certain  number  of  hereditarily  sacred  persons,  to  whom 
the  earth,  air,  and  water  of  the  world  belong,  as  personal  property ;  of 
wliich  earth,  air,  and  water  these  persons  may,  at  their  pleasure,  permit,  or 
forbid,  the  rest  of  the  human  race  to  eat,  to  breathe,  or  to  drink.  This 
theory  is  not  for  many  years  longer  tenable.  The  adverse  theory  is  that 
a  division  of  the  land  of  the  world  among  the  mob  of  the  world  would 
immediately  elevate  the  said  mob  into  sacred  personages;  that  houses 
would  then  build  themselves,  and  corn  grow  of  itself;  and  that  everybody 
would  be  able  to  live,  without  doing  any  work  for  his  living.  This  theory 
would  also  be  found  highly  untenable  in  practice. 

It  will,  however,  require  some  rough  experiments,  and  rougher  cata 
strophes,  even  hi  this  magnesium-lighted  epoch,  before  the  generality  of 
persons  will  be  convinced  that  no  law  concerning  anything,  least  of 
all  concerning  land,  for  either  holding  or  dividing  it,  or  renting  it 
high,  or  renting  it  low,  would  be  of  the  smallest  ultimate  use  to  the 
people,  so  long  as  the  general  contest  for  life,  and  for  the  means  of  life, 
remains  one  of  mere  brutal  competition.  That  contest,  in  an  unprincipled 
nation,  will  take  one  deadly  form  or  another,  whatever  laws  you  make  for 
it.  For  instance,  it  would  be  an  entirely  wholesome  law  for  England,  if  it 
could  bo  carried,  that  maximum  limits  should  be  assigned  to  incomes, 
according  to  classes ;  and  that  every  nobleman's  income  should  be  paid  to 
him  as  a  fixed  salary  or  pension  by  the  nation ;  and  not  squeezed  by  him 
in  a  variable  sum,  at  discretion,  out  of  the  tenants  of  his  land.  But  if  you 
could  get  such  a  law  passed  to-morrow;  and  if,  which  would  be  farther 
necessary,  you  could  fix  the  value  of  the  assigned  incomes  by  making  a 


44  SESAME   AND  LILIES. 

murderers.  Also,  a  great  nation  having  made  up  its  mind 
that  hanging  is  quite  the  wholesomest  process  for  its 

given  weight  of  pure  wheat-flour  legal  tender  for  a  given  sum,  a  twelve 
month  would  not  pass  before  another  currency  would  have  been  tacitly 
established,  and  the  power  of  accumulative  wealth  would  have  re-asserted 
itself  in  some  other  article,  or  some  imaginary  sign.  Eorbid  men  to  buy 
each  other's  lives  for  sovereigns,  and  they  will  for  shells,  or  slates.  There 
is  only  one  cure  for  public  distress — and  that  is  public  education,  directed 
to  make  men  thoughtful,  merciful,  and  just.  There  are,  indeed,  many  laws 
conceivable  which  would  gradually  better  and  strengthen  the  national 
temper ;  but,  for  the  most  part,  they  are  such  as  the  national  temper  must 
be  much  bettered  before  it  would  bear.  A  nation  in  its  youth  may  be 
helped  by  laws,  as  a  weak  child  by  backboards,  but  when  it  is  old,  it  cannot 
that  way  straighten  its  crooked  spine. 

And  besides,  the  problem  of  land,  at  its  worst,  is  a  bye  one ;  distribute 
the  earth  as  you  will,  the  principal  question  remains  inexorable, — Who  is 
to  dig  it  ?  Which  of  us,  hi  brief  words,  is  to  do  the  hard  and  dirty  work 
for  the  rest — and  for  what  pay?  Who  is  to  do  the  pleasant  and  clean 
work,  and  for  what  pay  ?  Who  is  to  do  no  work,  and  for  what  pay?  And 
there  are  curious  moral  and  religious  questions  connected  with  these.  How 
far  is  it  lawful  to  suck  a  portion  of  the  soul  out  of  a  great  many  persons, 
in  order  to  put  the  abstracted  psychical  quantities  together,  and  make  one 
very  beautiful  or  ideal  soul  ?  If  we  had  to  deal  with  mere  blood,  instead 
of  spirit,  and  the  thing  might  literally  be  done  (as  it  has  been  done  with 
infants  before  now)  so  that  it  were  possible,  by  taking  a  certain  quantity  of 
blood  from  the  arms  of  a  given  number  of  the  mob,  and  putting  it  all  into 
one  person,  to  make  a  more  azure-blooded  gentleman  of  him,  the  thing 


OF  KINGS'  TREASUKIES.  45 

homicides  in  general,  can  yet  with  mercy  distinguish 
between  the  degrees  of  guilt  in  homicides;  and  does  not 
yelp  like  a  pack  of  frost-pinched  wolf-cubs  on  the  blood 
track  of  an  unhappy  crazed  boy,  or  grey-haired  clodpatc 
Othello,  "  perplexed  i'  the  extreme,"  at  the  very  moment 
that  it  is  sending  a  Minister  of  the  Crown  to  make  polite 
speeches  to  a  man  who  is  bayoneting  young  girls  in  their 
father's  sight,  and  killing  noble  youths  in  cool  blood,  faster 
than  a  country  butcher  kills  lambs  in  spring.  And,  lastly, 
a  great  nation  does  not  mock  Heaven  and  its  Powers,  by 

would  of  course  be  managed ;  but  secretly,  I  should  conceive.  But  now, 
because  it  is  brain  and  soul  that  we  abstract,  not  visible  blood,  it  can  be 
done  quite  openly ;  and  we  live,  we  gentlemen,  on  delicatest  prey,  after  the 
manner  of  weasels ;  that  is  to  say,  we  keep  a  certain  number  of  clowns  dig 
ging  and  ditching,  and  generally  stupified,  in  order  that  we,  being  fed 
gratis,  may  have  all  the  thinking  and  feeling  to  ourselves.  Tet  there  is  a 
great  deal  to  be  said  for  this.  A  highly-bred  and  trained  English,  French, 
Austrian,  or  Italian  gentleman  (much  more  a  lady)  is  a  great  production ;  a 
better  production  than  most  statues ;  being  beautifully  coloured  as  well  as 
shaped,  and  plus  all  the  brains ;  a  glorious  thing  to  look  at,  a  wonderful 
thing  to  talk  to ;  and  you  cannot  have  it,  any  more  than  a  pyramid  or  a 
church,  but  by  sacrifice  of  much  contributed  life.  And  it  is,  perhaps, 
better  to  build  a  beautiful  human  creature  than  a  beautiful  dome  or  steeple  ; 
and  more  delightful  to  look  up  reverently  to  a  creature  far  above  us,  than 
to  a  wall ;  only  the  beautiful  human  creature  will  have  some  duties  to  do 
in  return— duties  of  living  belfry  and  rampart — of  which  presently. 


46  SESAME  AND  LILIES. 

pretending  belief  in  a  revelation  which  asserts  the  love 
of  money  to  be  the  root  of  all  evil,  and  declaring,  at 
the  same  time,  that  it  is  actuated,  and  intends  to  be 
actuated,  in  all  chief  national  deeds  and  measures,  by 
no  other  love. 

My  friends,  I  do  not  know  why  any  of  us  should  talk 
about  reading.  We  want  some  sharper  discipline  than  that 
of  reading ;  but,  at  all  events,  be  assured,  we  cannot  read. 
No  reading  is  possible  for  a  people  with  its  mind  in  this 
state.  No  sentence  of  any  great  writer  is  intelligible  to 
them.  It  is  simply  and  sternly  impossible  for  the  English 
public,  at  this  moment,  to  understand  any  thoughtful  writing, 
— so  incapable  of  thought  has  it  become  in  its  insanity  of 
avarice.  Happily,  our  disease  is,  as  yet,  little  worse  than 
this  incapacity  of  thought ;  it  is  not  corruption  of  the  inner 
nature ;  we  ring  true  still,  when  anything  strikes  home  to 
us ;  and  though  the  idea  that  everything  should  "  pay  "  kas 
infected  our  every  purpose  so  deeply,  that  even  when  we 
would  play  the  good  Samaritan,  we  never  take  out  our  two 
pence  and  give  them  to  the  host,  without  saying,  "  When  I 
come  again,  thou  shalt  give  me  fourpence,"  there  is  a  capa 
city  of  noble  passion  left  in  our  hearts'  core.  We  show  it  in 
our  work — in  our  war, — even  in  those  unjust  domestic  affec 
tions  which  make  us  furious  at  a  small  private  wrong,  while 
we  are  polite  to  a  boundless  public  one :  we  are  still  indus* 


OF  KINGS'  TREASURIES.  47 

trious  to  the  last  hour  of  the  day,  though  we  add  the  gam 
bler's  fury  to  the  labourer's  patience ;  we  are  still  brave  to 
the  death,  though  incapable  of  discerning  true  cause  for  bat 
tle,  and  are  still  true  in  affection  to  our  own  flesh,  to  the 
death,  as  the  sea-monsters  are,  and  the  rock-eagles.  And 
there  is  hope  for  a  nation  while  this  can  be  still  said  of  it, 
As  long  as  it  holds  its  life  in  its  hand,  ready  to  give  it  for  its 
honour  (though  a  foolish  honour),  for  its  love  (though  a  sel 
fish  love),  and  for  its  business  (though  a  base  business),  there 
is  hope  for  it.  But  hope  only ;  for  this  instinctive,  reckless 
virtue  cannot  last.  No  nation  can  last,  which  has  made  a 
mob  of  itself,  however  generous  at  heart.  It  must  discipline 
its  passions,  and  direct  them,  or  they  will  discipline  it,  one 
day,  with  scorpion  whips.  Above  all,  a  nation  cannot  last  as 
a  money-making  mob :  it  cannot  with  impunity, — it  cannot 
with  existence, — go  on  despising  literature,  despising  science, 
despising  art,  despising  nature,  despising  compassion,  and 
concentrating  its  soul  on  Pence.  Do  you  think  these 
are  harsh  or  wild  words  ?  Have  patience  with  me  but  a 
little  longer.  I  will  prove  their  truth  to  you,  clause  by 
clause. 

I.  I  say  first  we  have  despised  literature.  What  do  we,  as 
a  nation,  care  about  books  ?  How  much  do  you  think  we 
spend  altogether  on  our  libraries,  public  or  private,  as  com 
pared  with  what  we  spend  on  our  horses  ?  If  a  man  spends 


48  SESAME  AND  LILIES. 

lavishly  on  his  library,  you  call  him  mad — a  biblio-maniac. 
But  you  never  call  any  one  a  horse-maniac,  though  men  ruin 
themselves  every  day  by  their  horses,  and  you  do  not  hear 
of  people  ruining  themselves  by  their  books.  Or,  to  go  lower 
still,  how  much  do  you  think  the  contents  of  the  book-shelves 
of  the  United  Kingdom,  public  and  private,  would  fetch,  as 
compared  with  the  contents  of  its  wine-cellars  ?  What  posi 
tion  would  its  expenditure  on  literature  take,  as  compared 
with  its  expenditure  on  luxurious  eating  ?  We  talk  of  food 
for  the  mind,  as  of  food  for  the  body :  now  a  good  book  con 
tains  such  food  inexhaustibly ;  it  is  a  provision  for  life,  and^ 
for  the  best  part  of  us ;  yet  how  long  most  people  would  look 
at  the  best  book  before  they  would  give  the  price  of  a  large 
turbot  for  it !  Though  there  have  been  men  who  have 
pinched  their  stomachs  and  bared  their  backs  to  buy  a  book, 
whose  libraries  were  cheaper  to  them,  I  think,  in  the  end, 
than  most  men's  dinners  are.  We  are  few  of  us  put  to  such 
trial,  and  more  the  pity ;  for,  indeed,  a  precioiis  thing  is  all 
the  more  precious  to  us  if  it  has  been  won  by  work  or 
economy ;  and  if  public  libraries  were  half  as  costly  as  pub 
lic  dinners,  or  books  cost  the  tenth  part  of  what  bracelets 
do,  even  foolish  men  and  women  might  sometimes  suspect 
there  was  good  in  reading,  as  well  as  in  munching  and  spark 
ling;  whereas  the  very  cheapness  of  literature  is  making 
even  wise  people  forget  that  if  a  book  is  worth  reading,  it  is 


OF  KINGS'  TREASURIES.  49 

worth  buying.  No  book  is  worth  anything  which  is  not 
worth  much  /  nor  is  it  serviceable,  until  it  has  been  read,  and 
reread,  and  loved,  and  loved  again ;  and  marked,  so  that  you 
can  refer  to  the  passages  you  want  in  it,  as  a  soldier  can 
seize  the  weapon  he  needs  in  an  armoury,  or  a  housewife 
bring  the  spice  she  needs  from  her  store.  Bread  of  flour  is 
good  ;  but  there  is  bread,  sweet  as  honey,  if  we  would  eat  it, 
in  a  good  book  ;  and  the  family  must  be  poor  indeed  which, 
once  in  their  lives,  cannot,  for  such  multipliable  barley-loaves, 
pay  their  baker's  bill.  We  call  ourselves  a  rich  nation,  and 
we  are  filthy  and  foolish  enough  to  thumb  each  other's  books 
out  of  circulating  libraries ! 

II.  I  say  we  have  despised  science.  "  What !"  (you  ex 
claim)  "  are  we  not  foremost  in  all  discovery,  and  is  not  the 
whole  world  giddy  by  reason,  or  unreason,  of  our  inven 
tions?"  Yes;  but  do  you  suppose  that  is  national  work? 
That  work  is  all  done  in  spite  of  the  nation ;  by  private 
people's  zeal  and  money.  We  are  glad  enough,  indeed,  to 
make  our  profit  of  science ;  we  snap  up  anything  in  the  way 
of  a  scientific  bone  that  has  meat  on  it,  eagerly  enough ;  but 
if  the  scientific  man  comes  for  a  bone  or  a  crust  to  ws,  that 
is  another  story.  What  have  we  publicly  done  for  science  ? 
We  are  obliged  to  know  what  o'clock  it  is,  for  the  safety  of 
our  ships,  and  therefore  we  pay  for  an  observatory ;  and  we 
allow  ourselves,  in  the  person  of  our  Parliament,  to  be  annu- 


60  SESAME  AND   LILIES. 

ally  tormented  into  doing  something,  in  a  slovenly  way, 
for  the  British  Museum ;  sullenly  apprehending  that  to  be  a 
place  for  keeping  stuffed  birds  in,  to  amuse  our  children.  If 
anybody  will  pay  for  their  own  telescope,  and  resolve  ano 
ther  nebula,  we  cackle  over  the  discernment  as  if  it  were  our 
own;  if  one  in  ten  thousand  of  our  hunting  squires  suddenly 
perceives  that  the  earth  was  indeed  made  to  be  something 
else  than  a  portion  for  foxes,  and  burrows  in  it  himself,  and 
tells  us  where  the  gold  is,  and  where  the  coals,  we  understand 
that  there  is  some  use  in  that;  and  very  properly  knight  him: 
but  is  the  accident  of  his  having  found  out  how  to  employ 
himself  usefully  any  credit  to  us?  (The  negation  of  such 
discovery  among  his  brother  squires  may  perhaps  be  some 
discredit  to  us,  if  we  would  consider  of  it.)  But  if  you  doubt 
these  generalities,  here  is  one  fact  for  us  all  to  meditate  upon, 
illustrative  of  our  love  of  science.  Two  years  ago  there  was 
a  collection  of  the  fossils  of  Solenhofen  to  be  sold  in  Bavaria ; 
the  best  in  existence,  containing  many  specimens  unique  for 
perfectness,  and  one,  unique  as  an  example  of  a  species  (a 
whole  kingdom  of  unknown  living  creatures  being  announced 
by  that  fossil).  This  collection,  of  which  the  mere  market 
worth,  among  private  buyers,  would  probably  have  been 
some  thousand  or  twelve  hundred  pounds,  was  offered  to  the 
English  nation  for  seven  hundred:  but  we  would  not  give 
seven  hundred,  and  the  whole  series  would  have  been  in  the 


61 

Munich  museum  at  this  moment,  if  Professor  O  wen*  had  not, 
with  loss  of  his  own  time,  and  patient  tormenting  of  the  Bri 
tish  public  in  person  of  its  representatives,  got  leave  to  give 
four  hundred  pounds  at  once,  and  himself  become  answer 
able  for  the  other  three !  which  the  said  public  will  doubtless 
pay  him  eventually,  but  sulkily,  and  caring  nothing  about 
the  matter  all  the  while ;  only  always  ready  to  cackle  if  any 
credit  comes  of  it.  Consider,  I  beg  of  you,  arithmetically, 
what  this  fact  means.  Your  annual  expenditure  for  public 
purposes  (a  third  of  it  for  military  apparatus)  is  at  least  50 
millions.  Now  700?.  is  to  50,000,000^.  roughly,  as  seven 
pence  to  two  thousand  pounds.  Suppose  then,  a  gentleman 
of  unknown  income,  but  whose  wealth  was  to  be  conjectured 
from  the  fact  that  he  spent  two  thousand  a  year  on  his  park- 
walls  and  footmen  only,  professes  himself  fond  of  science ; 
and  that  one  of  his  servants  comes  eagerly  to  tell  him  that 
an  unique  collection  of  fossils,  giving  clue  to  a  new  era  of 
creation,  is  to  be  had  for  the  sum  of  seven  pence  sterling ; 
and  that  the  gentleman,  who  is  fond  of  science,  and  spends 
two  thousand  a  year  on  his  park,  answers,  after  keeping  his 
servant  waiting  several  months,  "Well!  I'll  give  you  four 

*  I  state  this  fact  without  Professor  Owen's  permission :  which  of  course 
he  could  not  with  propriety  have  granted,  had  I  asked  it;  but  I  consider 
it  so  important  that  the  public  should  be  aware  of  the  fact,  that  I  do  what 
seems  to  mo  right,  though  rude. 


52  SESAME  AND  LILIES. 

ponce  for  them,  if  you  will  be  answerable  for  the  extra  three 
pence  yourself,  till  next  year !" 

III.  I  say  you  have  despised  Art!  "What!"  you  again 
answer,  "have  we  not  Art  exhibitions,  miles  long?  and  do  we 
not  pay  thousands  of  pounds  for  single  pictures  ?  and  have 
we  not  Art  schools  and  institutions,  more  than  ever  nation 
had  before  ?"  Yes,  truly,  but  all  that  is  for  the  sake  of  the 
shop.  You  would  fain  sell  canvas  as  well  as  coals,  end  crock 
ery  as  well  as  iron;  you  would  take  every  other  nation's 
bread  out  of  its  mouth  if  you  could ;  not  being  able  to  do 
that,  your  ideal  of  life  is  to  stand  in  the  thoroughfares  of  the 
world,  like  Ludgate  apprentices,  screaming  to  every  passer 
by,  "What  d'ye  lack?"  You  know  nothing  of  your  own 
faculties  or  circumstances ;  you  fancy  that,  among  your  damp, 
flat,  fat  fields  of  clay,  you  can  have  as  quick  art-fancy  as  the 
Frenchman  among  his  bronzed  vines,  or  the  Italian  under  his 
volcanic  cliffs ; — that  Art  may  be  learned  as  book-keeping  is, 
and  when  learned,  will  give  you  more  books  to  keep.  You 
care  for  pictures,  absolutely,  no  more  than  you  do  for  the 
bills  pasted  on  your  dead  walls.  There  is  always  room  on 
the  wall  for  the  bills  to  be  read, — never  for  the  pictures  to 
be  seen.  You  do  not  know  what  pictures  you  have  (by 
repute)  in  the  country,  nor  whether  they  are  false  or  true, 
nor  whether  they  are  taken  care  of  or  not ;  in  foreign  coun 
tries,  you  calmly  see  the  noblest  existing  pictures  in  the 


OF   KINGS'   TREASURIES.  53 

world  rotting  in  abandoned  wreck — (and,  in  Venice,  with  tho 
Austrian  guns  deliberately  pointed  at  the  palaces  containing 
them),  and  if  you  heard  that  all  the  Titians  in  Europe  were 
made  sand-bags  to-morrow  on  the  Austrian  forts,  it  would 
not  trouble  you  so  much  as  the  chance  of  a  brace  or  two  of 
game  less  in  your  own  bags  in  a  day's  shooting.  That  is 
your  national  love  of  Art. 

IV.  You  have  despised  nature ;  that  is  to  say,  all  the  deep 
and  sacred  sensations  of  natural  scenery.  The  French  revo 
lutionists  made  stables  of  the  cathedrals  of  France ;  you  have 
made  racecourses  of  the  cathedrals  of  the  earth.  Your  one 
conception  of  pleasure  is  to  drive  in  railroad  carriages  round 
their  aisles,  and  eat  off  their  altars.  You  have  put  a  railroad 
bridge  over  the  fall  of  Schaffhausen.  You  have  tunnelled 
the  cliffs  of  Lucerne  by  Toll's  chapel ;  you  have  destroyed 
the  Clarens  shore  of  the  Lake  of  Geneva;  there  is  not  a  quiet 
valley  in  England  that  you  have  not  filled  with  bellowing 
fire ;  there  is  no  particle  left  of  English  land  which  you  have 
not  trampled  coal  ashes  into — nor  any  foreign  city  in  which 
the  spread  of  your  presence  is  not  marked  among  its  fair  old 
streets  and  happy  gardens  by  a  consuming  white  leprosy  of 
new  hotels  and  perfumers'  shops:  the  Alps  themselves,  which 
your  own  poets  used  to  love  so  reverently,  you  look  upon  as 
soaped  poles  in  a  bear-garden,  which  you  set  yourselves  to 
climb,  and  slide  down  again,  with  "shrieks  of  delight." 


64  SESAME  AND  LILIES. 

When  you  are  past  shrieking,  having  no  human  articulate 
voice  to  say  you  are  glad  with,  you  fill  the  quietude  of  their 
valleys  with  gunpowder  blasts,  and  rush  home,  red  with 
cutaneous  eruption  of  conceit,  and  voluble  with  convulsive 
hiccough  of  self-satisfaction.  I  think  nearly  the  two  sorrow- 
fullest  spectacles  I  have  ever  seen  in  humanity,  taking  the 
deep  inner  significance  of  them,  are  the  English  mobs  in  the 
valley  of  Chamouni,  amusing  themselves  with  firing  rusty 
howitzers;  and  the  Swiss  vintagers  of  Zurich  expressing 
their  Christian  thanks  for  the  gift  of  the  vine,  by  assembling 
in  knots  in  the  "  towers  of  the  vineyards,"  and  slowly 
loading  and  firing  horse-pistols  from  morning  till  evening. 
It  is  pitiful  to  have  dim  conceptions  of  duty ;  more 
pitiful,  it  seems  to  me,  to  have  conceptions  like  these,  of 
mirth. 

Lastly.  You  despise  compassion.  There  is  no  need  of 
words  of  mine  for  proof  of  this.  I  will  merely  print  one  of 
the  newspaper  paragraphs  which  I  am  in  the  habit  of  cutting 
out  and  throwing  into  my  store-drawer ;  here  is  one  from  a 
Daily  Telegraph  of  an  early  date  this  year;  date  which, 
though  by  me  carelessly  left  unmarked,  is  easily  discoverable ; 
for  on  the  back  of  the  slip,  there  is  the  announcement  that 
"yesterday  the  seventh  of  the  special  services  of  this  year 
was  performed  by  the  Bishop  of  Kipon  in  St.  Paul's ; "  and 
there  is  a  pretty  piece  of  modern  political  economy  besides, 


OF  KINGS'  TREASURIES.  65 

worth  preserving  note  of,  I  think,  so  I  print  it  in  the  note 
below.*  But  my  business  is  with  the  main  paragraph,  relat 
ing  one  of  such  facts  as  happen  now  daily,  which,  by  chance, 
has  taken  a  form  in  which  it  came  before  the  coroner.  I 
will  print  the  paragraph  in  red.f  Be  sure,  the  facts  them 
selves  are  written  in  that  colour,  in  a  book  which  we  shall  all 
of  us,  literate  or  illiterate,  have  to  read  our  page  of,  some 


"An  inquiry  was  held  on  Friday  by  Mr.  Richards,  deputy 
coroner,  at  the  White  Horse  Tavern,  Christ  Church,  Spital- 
fields,  respecting  the  death  of  Michael  Collins,  aged  58  years. 
Mary  Collins,  a  miserable-looking  woman,  said  that  she  lived 
with  the  deceased  and  his  son  in  a  room  at  2,  Cobb's  court, 
Christ  Church.  Deceased  was  a  'translator'  of  boots. 
Witness  went  out  and  bought  old  boots;  deceased  and  his 
sou  made  them  into  good  ones,  and  then  witness  sold  them 

*  It  is  announced  that  an  arrangement  has  been  concluded  between 
the  Ministry  of  Finance  and  the  Bank  of  Credit  for  the  payment  of  the 
eleven  millions  which  the  State  has  to  pay  to  the  National  Bank  by  the  14th 
inst.  This  sum  will  be  raised  as  follows : — The  eleven  commercial  members 
of  the  committee  of  the  Bank  of  Credit  will  each  borrow  a  million  of  florins 
for  three  months  of  this  bank,  which  will  accept  their  bills,  which  again 
will  be  discounted  by  the  National  Bank.  By  this  arrangement  the  National 
Rink  will  itself  furnish  the  funds  with  which  it  witt  be  paid. 

f  The  following  extract  was  printed  in  red  in  the  English  edition. 


66  SESAME   AND   LILIES. 

for  what  she  could  get  at  the  shops,  which  was  very  little 
indeed.  Deceased  and  his  son  used  to  work  night  and  day  to 
try  and  get  a  little  bread  and  tea,  and  pay  for  the  room 
(2s.  a  week),  so  as  to  keep  the  home  together.  On  Friday 
night  week  deceased  got  up  from  his  bench  and  began  to 
shiver.  He  threw  down  the  boots,  saying,  <  Somebody  else 
must  finish  them  when  I  am  gone,  for  I  can  do  no  more.' 
There  was  no  fire,  and  he  said,  '  I  would  be  better  if  I  was 
warm.'  Witness  therefore  took  two  pairs  of  translated 
boots  to  sell  at  the  shop,  but  she  could  only  get  14c£.  for 
the  two  pairs,  for  the  people  at  the  shop  said,  '  We  must 
have  our  profit.'  Witness  got  14lb.  of  coal,  and  a  little 
tea  and  bread.  Her  son  sat  up  the  whole  night  to  make  the 
'  translations,'  to  get  money,  but  deceased  died  on  Saturday 
morning.  The  family  never  had  enough  to  eat. — Coroner: 
4  It  seems  to  me  deplorable  that  you  did  not  go  into  the 
workhouse.' — Witness:  'We  wanted  the  comforts  of  our 
little  home.'  A  juror  asked  what  the  comforts  were,  for 
he  only  saw  a  little  straw  in  the  corner  of  the  room,  the 
windows  of  which  were  broken.  The  witness  began  to  cry, 
and  said  that  they  had  a  quilt  and  other  little  things.  The 
deceased  said  he  never  would  go  into  the  workhouse.  In 
summer,  when  the  season  was  good,  they  sometimes  made  as 
much  as  105.  profit  in  the  week.  They  then  always  saved 
towards  the  next  week,  which  was  generally  a  bad  one.  In 


57 

winter  they  made  not  half  so  much.  For  three  years  tney 
had  been  getting  from  bad  to  worse. — Cornelius  Collins  said 
that  he  had  assisted  his  father  since  1847.  They  used  to 
work  so  far  into  the  night  that  both  nearly  lost  their 
eyesight.  Witness  now  had  a  film  over  his  eyes.  Five 
years  ago  deceased  applied  to  the  parish  for  aid.  The 
relieving  officer  gave  him  a  4lb.  loaf,  and  told  him  if 
he  came  again  he  should  c  get  the  stones.'  *  That  disgusted 

*  I  do  not  know  what  this  means.  It  is  curiously  coincident  in  verbal 
form,  with  a  certain  passage  which  some  of  us  may  remember.  It 
may  perhaps  be  well  to  preserve  beside  this  paragraph,  another  cutting 
out  of  my  store-drawer,  from  the  Morning  Post,  of  about  a  parallel  date, 

Friday,  March  10th,  1865:— "The  salons  of  Mme.  C ,  who  did  the 

honours  with  clever  imitative  grace  and  elegance,  were  crowded  with 
princes,  dukes,  marquises,  and  counts — in  fact,  with  the  same  male  com 
pany  as  one  meets  at  the  parties  of  the  Princess  Metternich  and  Madame 
Drouyn  de  Lhuys.  Some  English  peers  and  members  of  Parliament  were 
present,  and  appeared  to  enjoy  the  animated  and  dazzlingly  improper  scene. 
On  the  second  floor  the  supper  tables  were  loaded  with  every  delicacy 
of  the  season.  That  your  readers  may  form  some  idea  of  the  dainty 
fare  of  the  Parisian  demimonde,  I  copy  the  menu  of  the  supper,  which 
was  served  to  'all  the  guests  (about  200)  seated  at  four  o'clock.  Choice 
Yquem,  Johannisberg,  Laffitte,  Tokay,  and  Champagne  of  the  finest 
vintages  were  served  most  lavishly  throughout  the  morning.  After 
supper  dancing  was  resumed  with  increased  animation,  and  the  ball 
terminated  with  a  chains  didbolique  and  a  cancan  tfenfer  at  seven  in  the 

morning.     (Morning-service — 'Ere  the  fresh  lawns  appeared,  under  thj 

3* 


58  SESAME  AND  LILIES. 

deceased,  and  lie  would  have  nothing  to  do  with  them  since 
They  got  worse  and  worse  until  last  Friday  week,  when 
they  had  not  even  a  halfpenny  to  buy  a  caudle.  Deceased 
then  lay  down  on  the  straw,  and  said  he  could  not  live 
till  morning. — A  juror:  You  are  dying  of  starvation  yourself, 
and  you  ought  to  go  into  the  house  until  the  summer. 
Witness :  If  we  went  in  we  should  die.  When  we  come  out 
in  the  summer  we  should  be  like  people  dropped  from  the 
sky.  No  one  would  know  us,  and  we  would  not  have  even 
a  room.  I  could  work  now  if  I  had  food,  for  my  sight 
would  get  better.  Dr.  G.  P.  Walker  said  deceased  died 
from  syncope,  from  exhaustion  from  want  of  food.  The 
deceased  had  had  no  bedclothes.  For  four  months  he  had 
had  nothing  but  bread  to  eat.  There  was  not  a  particle 
of  fat  in  the  body.  There  was  no  disease,  but  if  there 
had  been  medical  attendance,  he  might  have  survived  the 
syncope  or  fainting.  The  coroner  having  remarked  upon  the 
painful  nature  of  the  case,  the  jury  returned  the  following 

opening  eyelids  of  the  Morn. — *)  Here  is  the  menu: — 'Consomme  de 
volaille  a  la  Bagration ;  16  hors-d'oeuvres  varies.  Bouchees  a  la  Talley 
rand.  Saumons  froids,  sauce  Kavigote.  Filets  de  bceuf  en  Belle  vue, 
timbales  milanaises  chandfroid  de  gibier.  Dindes  truffees.  Pates  de 
foie<3  gras,  buissons  d'e3revisses,  salades  venetiennes,  gelees  blanches 
aux  fruits,  gateaux  mani'.ini,  parisiens  et  parisiennes.  Frontages  glaces 
Ananis.  Dessert' " 


OF  KINGS7   TKEASUKIES.  59 

verdict,  'That  deceased  died  from  exhaustion  from  want  of 
food  and  the  common  necessaries  of  life;  also  through  want 
of  medical  aid.' " 

"  Why  would  witness  not  go  into  the  workhouse  ?"  you 
ask.  Well,  the  poor  seem  to  have  a  prejudice  against  the 
workhouse  which  the  rich  have  not ;  for  of  course  every  one 
who  takes  a  pension  from  Government  goes  into  the  work 
house  on  a  grand  scale :  only  the  workhouses  for  the 
rich  do  not  involve  the  idea  of  work,  and  should  be  called 
play-houses.  But  the  poor  like  to  die  independently,  it 
appears  ;  perhaps  if  we  made  the  play-houses  for  them  pretty 
and  pleasant  enough,  or  gave  them  their  pensions  at  home, 
and  allowed  them  a  little  introductory  peculation  with  the 
public  money,  their  minds  might  be  reconciled  to  it.  Mean 
time,  here  are  the  facts  :  we  make  our  relief  either  so  insult 
ing  to  them,  or  so  painful,  that  they  rather  die  than  take  it  at 
our  hands;  or,  for  third  alternative,  we  leave  them  so 
untaught  and  foolish  that  they  starve  like  brute  creatures, 
wild  and  dumb,  not  knowing  what  to  do,  or  what  to  ask.  I 
say,  you  despise  compassion ;  if  you  did  not,  such  a  news 
paper  paragraph  would  be  as  impossible  in  a  Christian 
country  as  a  deliberate  assassination  permitted  in  its  public 
streets.*  "Christian"  did  I  say?  Alas,  if  we  were  but 

*  I   wn  heartily  glad  to  see  such  a  paper  as  the  PaU  Mali  Gazette 


60  SESAME  AND   LILIES. 

wholesomely  un-Christian,  it  would  be  impossible :  it  is  our 
imaginary  Christianity  that  helps  us  to  commit  these  crimes, 

established ;  for  the  power  of  the  press  in  the  hands  of  highly-educated 
men,  in  independent  position,  and  of  honest  purpose,  may  indeed  become 
all  that  it  has  been  hitherto  vainly  vaunted  to  be.  Its  editor  will  therefore, 
I  doubt  not,  pardon  me,  in  that,  by  very  reason  of  my  respect  for  the 
journal,  I  do  not  let  pass  unnoticed  an  article  in  its  third  number,  page  5, 
which  was  wrong  in  every  word  of  it,  with  the  intense  wrongness  which 
only  an  honest  man  can  achieve  who  has  taken  a  false  turn  of  thought 
in  the  outset,  and  is  following  it,  regardless  of  consequences.  It  contained 
at  the  end  this  notable  passage : — 

"  The  bread  of  affliction,  and  the  water  of  affliction — aye,  and  the  bed 
steads  and  blankets  of  affliction,  are  the  very  utmost  that  the  law  ought  to 
give  to  outcasts  merely  as  outcasts."  I  merely  put  beside  this  expression  of 
the  gentlemanly  mind  of  England  hi  1865,  a  part  of  the  message  which 
Isaiah  was  ordered  to  "lift  up  his  voice  like  a  trumpet"  in  declaring  to  the 
gentlemen  of  his  day:  "Ye  fast  for  strife,  and  to  smite  with  the  fist 
of  wickedness.  la  not  this  the  fast  that  I  have  chosen,  to  deal  thy  bread 
to  the  hungry,  and  that  thou  bring  the  poor  that  are  cast  out  (margin 
'afflicted')  to  thy  house."  The  falsehood  on  which  the  writer  had  mentally 
founded  himself,  as  previously  stated  by  him,  was  this :  "  To  confound  the 
functions  of  the  dispensers  of  the  poor-rates  with  those  of  the  dispensers 
of  a  charitable  institution  is  a  great  and  pernicious  error."  This  sentence 
is  so  accurately  and  exquisitely  wrong,  that  its  substance  must  be  thus 
reversed  in  our  minds  before  we  can  deal  with  any  existing  problem 
of  national  distress.  "  To  understand  that  the  dispensers  of  the  poor-rates 
are  the  almoners  of  the  nation  and  should  distribute  its  alms  with  a 


61 

for  we  revel  and  luxuriate  in  our  faith,  for  the  lewd  sensation 
of  it ;  dressing  it  up,  like  everything  else,  in  fiction.  The 
dramatic  Chiistianity  of  the  organ  and  aisle,  of  dawn-service 
and  twilight-revival — the  Christianity  which  we  do  not  fear 
to  mix  the  mockery  of,  pictorially,  with  our  play  about  the 
devil,  in  our  Satanellas, — Roberts,— Fausts,  chanting  hymns 
through  traceried  windows  for  back-ground  effect,  and  artisti 
cally  modulating  the  "  Dio  "  through  variation  on  variation 
of  mimicked  prayer :  (while  we  distribute  tracts,  next  day, 
for  the  benefit  of  uncultivated  swearers,  upon  what  we 
suppose  to  be  the  signification  of  the  Third  Commandment ;) 
— this  gas-lighted,  and  gas-inspired,  Christianity,  we  are 
triumphant  in,  and  draw  back  the  hem  of  our  robes  from  the 
touch  of  the  heretics  who  dispute  it.  But  to  do  a  piece  of 
common  Christian  righteousness  in  a  plain  English  word  01 
deed ;  to  make  Christian  law  any  rule  of  life,  and  found  one 
National  act  or  hope  thereon, — we  know  too  well  what  our 
faith  comes  to  for  that !  You  might  sooner  get  lightning 
out  of  incense  smoke  than  true  action  or  passion  out  of  your 
modern  English  religion.  You  had  better  get  rid  of  the 
smoke,  and  the  organ  pipes,  both:  leave  them,  and  the 

gentleness  and  freedom  of  hand  as  much  greater  and  franker  than  that 
possible  to  individual  charity,  as  the  collective  national  wisdom  and  power 
may  be  supposed  greater  than  those  of  any  single  person,  is  the  foundation 
of  all  law  respecting'  pauperism." 


62  SESAME  AND  LILIES. 

Gothic  windows,  and  the  painted  glass,  to  the  property  man ; 
give  up  your  carburetted  hydrogen  ghost  in  one  healthy 
expiration,  and  look  after  Lazarus  at  the  door-step.  For 
there  is  a  true  Church  wherever  one  hand  meets  another 
helpfully,  and  that  is  the  only  holy  or  Mother  Church  which 
ever  was,  or  ever  shall  be. 

All  these  pleasures,  then,  and  all  these  virtues,  I  repeat, 
you  nationally  despise.  You  have,  indeed,  men  among  you 
who  do  not ;  by  whose  work,  by  whose  strength,  by  whose 
life,  by  whose  death,  you  live,  and  never  thank  them.  Your 
wealth,  your  amusement,  your  pride,  would  all  be  alike 
impossible,  but  for  those  whom  you  scorn  or  forget.  The 
policeman,  who  is  walking  up  and  down  the  black  lane  all 
night  to  watch  the  guilt  you  have  created  there,  and  may 
have  his  brains  beaten  out  and  be  maimed  for  life  at  any 
moment,  and  never  be  thanked  ;  the  sailor  wrestling  with  the 
sea's  rage ;  the  quiet  student  poring  over  his  book  or  his 
vial ;  the  common  worker,  without  praise,  and  nearly  without 
bread,  fulfilling  his  task  as  your  horses  drag  your  carts,  hope 
less,  and  spurned  of  all :  these  are  the  men  by  whom  Eng 
land  lives ;  but  they  are  not  the  nation ;  they  are  only  the 
body  and  nervous  force  of  it,  acting  still  from  old  habit  in  a 
convulsive  perseverance,  while  the  mind  is  gone.  Our 
National  mind  and  purpose  are  to  be  amused ;  our  National 
religion,  the  performance  of  church  ceremonies,  and  preach- 


ing  of  soporific  truths  (or  untruths)  to  keep  the  mob  quietly 
at  work,  while  we  amuse  ourselves  ;  and  the  necessity  for 
this  amusement  is  fastening  on  us  as  a  feverous  disease  of 
parched  throat  and  wandering  eyes  —  senseless,  dissolute, 
merciless.  When  men  are  rightly  occupied,  their  amuse 
ment  grows  out  of  their  work,  as  the  colour-petals  out  of  a 
fruitful  flower; — when  they  are  faithfully  helpful  and  com 
passionate,  all  their  emotions  become  steady,  deep,  perpetual, 
and  vivifying  to  the  soul  as  the  natural  pulse  to  the  body. 
But  now,  having  no  true  business,  we  pour  our  whole  mascu 
line  energy  into  the  false  business  of  money-making ;  and 
having  no  true  emotion,  we  must  have  false  emotions  dressed 
up  for  us  to  play  with,  not  innocently,  as  children  with  dolls, 
but  guiltily  and  darkly,  as  the  idolatrous  Jews  with  their  pic 
tures  on  cavern  walls,  which  men  had  to  dig  to  detect.  The 
justice  we  do  not  execute,  we  mimic  in  the  novel  and  on  the 
stage;  for  the  beauty  we  destroy  in  nature,  we  substitute 
the  metamorphosis  of  the  pantomime,  and  (the  human  nature 
of  us  imperatively  requiring  awe  and  sorrow  of  some  kind) 
for  the  noble  grief  we  should  have  borne  with  our  fellows, 
and  the  pure  tears  we  should  have  wept  with  them,  we  gloat 
over  the  pathos  of  the  police  court,  and  gather  the  night-dew 
of  the  grave. 

It  is  difficult  to   estimate  the  true   significance  of  these 
things ;    the  facts  are  frightful  enough  ; — the  measure  of 


64  SESAME   AND   LILIES. 

national  fault  involved  in  them  is  perhaps  not  as  great  as  it 
would  at  first  seem.  We  permit,  or  cause,  thousands  of 
deaths  daily,  but  we  mean  no  harm ;  we  set  fire  to  houses, 
and  ravage  peasants'  fields ;  yet  we  should  be  sorry  to  find 
we  had  injured  anybody.  We  are  still  kind  at  heart ;  still 
capable  of  virtue,  but  only  as  children  are.  Chalmers,  at  the 
end  of  his  long  life,  having  had  much  power  with  the  public, 
being  plagued  in  some  serious  matter  by  a  reference  to 
"public  opinion,"  uttered  the  impatient  exclamation,  "The 
public  is  just  a  great  baby !"  And  the  reason  that  I  have 
allowed  all  these  graver  subjects  of  thought  to  mix  them 
selves  up  with  an  inquiry  into  methods  of  reading,  is  that, 
the  more  I  see  of  our  national  faults  or  miseries,  the  more 
they  resolve  themselves  into  conditions  of  childish  illiterate- 
ness,  and  want  of  education  in  the  most  ordinary  habits  of 
thought.  It  is,  I  repeat,  not  vice,  not  selfishness,  not  dulness 
of  brain,  'which  we  have  to  lament ;  but  an  unreachable 
schoolboy's  recklessness,  only  differing  from  the  true  school 
boy's  in  its  incapacity  of  being  helped,  because  it  acknow 
ledges  no  master.  There  is  a  curious  type  of  us  given  in 
one  of  the  lovely,  neglected  works  of  the  last  of  our  great 
painters.  It  is  a  drawing  of  Kirkby  Lonsdale  churchyard, 
and  of  its  brook,  and  valley,  and  hills,  and  folded  morning 
sky  beyond.  And  unmindful  alike  of  these,  and  of  the  dead 
who  have  left  the.^e  for  other  valleys  and  for  other  skies,  a 


OF   KINGS'   TREASUKIES.  65 

gioup  of  schoolboys  have  piled  their  little  books  upon  a 
grave,  to  strike  them  off  with  stones.  So  do  we  play  with 
the  words  of  the  dead  that  would  teach  us,  and  strike  them 
far  from  us  with  our  bitter,  reckless  will,  little  thinking  that 
those  leaves  which  the  wind  scatters  had  been  piled,  not  only 
upon  a  gravestone,  but  upon  the  seal  of  an  enchanted  vault — 
nay,  the  gate  of  a  great  city  of  sleeping  kings,  who  would 
awake  for  us,  and  walk  with  us,  if  we  knew  but  how  to  call 
them  by  their  names.  How  often,  even  if  we  lift  the  marble 
entrance  gate,  do  we  but  wander  among  those  old  kings  in 
their  repose,  and  finger  the  robes  they  lie  in,  and  stir  the 
crowns  on  their  foreheads  ;  and  still  they  are  silent  to  us,  and 
seem  but  a  dusty  imagery ;  because  we  know  not  the  incan 
tation  of  the  heart  that  would  wake  them; — which,  if  they 
once  heard,  they  would  start  up  to  meet  us  in  their  power 
of  long  ago,  narrowly  to  look  upon  us,  and  consider  us  ;  and, 
as  the  fallen  kings  of  Hades  meet  the  newly  fallen,  saying, 
"  Art  thou  also  become  weak  as  we — art  thou  also  become 
one  of  us  ?"  so  would  these  kings,  with  their  undimmed, 
unshaken  diadems,  meet  us,  saying,  "Art  thou  also  become 
pure  and  mighty  of  heart  as  we  ?  art  thou  also  become  one 
of  us  ?" 

Mighty  of  heart,  mighty  of  mind — "magnanimous" — to 
be  this,  is  indeed  to  be  great  in  life  ;  to  become  this  increas 
ingly,  is,  indeed,  to  "  advance  in  life," — in  life  itself — not  in 


66  SESAME  AND   LILIES. 

the  trappings  of  it.  My  friends,  do  you  rememlter  that  old 
Scythian  custom,  when  the  head  of  a  house  died  ?  How  he 
was  dressed  in  his  finest  dress,  and  set  in  his  chariot,  and 
carried  about  to  his  friends'  houses ;  and  each  of  them  placed 
him  at  his  table's  head,  and  all  feasted  in  his  presence  ? 
Suppose  it  were  offered  to  you,  in  plain  words,  as  it  is  offered 
to  you  in  dire  facts,  that  you  should  gain  this  Scythian  hon 
our,  gradually,  while  you  yet  thought  yourself  alive.  Sup 
pose  the  offer  were  this :  "  You  shall  die  slowly ;  your  blood 
shall  daily  grow  cold,  your  flesh  petrify,  your  heart  beat  at 
last  only  as  a  rusted  group  of  iron  valves.  Tour  life  shall 
fade  from  you,  and  sink  through  the  earth  into  the  ice  of 
Caina ;  but,  day  by  day,  your  body  shall  be  dressed  more 
gaily,  and  set  in  higher  chariots,  and  have  more  orders  on 
its  breast — crowns  on  its  head,  if  you  will.  Men  shall  bow 
before  it,  stare  and  shout  round  it,  crowd  after  it  up  and 
down  the  streets ;  build  palaces  for  it,  feast  with  it  at  their 
tables'  heads  all  the  night  long ;  your  soul  shall  stay  enough 
within  it  to  know  what  they  do,  and  feel  the  weight  of  the 
golden  dress  on  its  shoulders,  and  the  furrow  of  the  crown- 
edge  on  the  skull ; — no  more.  Would  you  take  the  offer, 
verbally  made  by  the  death-angel?  Would  the  meanest 
among  us  take  it,  think  you  ?  Yet  practically  and  verily  we 
grasp  at  it,  every  one  of  us,  in  a  measure ;  many  of  us  grasp 
at  it  in  its  fulness  of  horror.  Every  man  accepts  it,  who 


OF   KINGS'   TREASURIES.  67 

desires  to  advance  in  life  without  knowing  what  life  is  ;  who 
means  only  that  he  is  to  get  more  horses,  and  more  footmen, 
and  more  fortune,  and  more  public  honour,  and — not  more 
personal  soul.  He  only  is  advancing  in  life,  whose  heart  is 
getting  softer,  whose  blood  warmer,  whose  brain  quicker, 
whose  spirit  is  entering  into  Living  *  peace.  And  the  men 
who  have  this  life  in  them  are  the  true  lords  or  kings  of  the 
earth — they,  and  they  only.  All  other  kingships,  so  far  as 
they  are  true,  are  only  the  practical  issue  and  expression  of 
theirs  ;  if  less  than  this,  they  are  either  dramatic  royalties, — 
costly  shows,  with  real  jewels  instead  of  tinsel — the  toys  of 
nations ;  or  else,  they  are  no  royalties  at  all,  but  tyrannies, 
or  the  mere  active  and  practical  issue  of  national  folly ;  for 
which  reason  I  have  said  of  them  elsewhere,  "Visible  govern 
ments  are  the  toys  of  some  nations,  the  diseases  of  others, 
the  harness  of  some,  the  burdens  of  more." 

But  I  have  no  words  for  the  wonder  with  which  I  hear 
Kinghood  still  spoken  of,  even  among  thoughtful  men,  as  if 
governed  nations  were  a  personal  property,  and  might  be 
bought  and  sold,  or  otherwise  acquired,  as  sheep,  of  whose 
flesh  their  king  was  to  feed,  and  whose  fleece  he  was  to 
gather ;  as  if  Achilles'  indignant  epithet  of  base  kings,  "  peo 
ple-eating,"  were  the  constant  and  proper  title  of  all  mo- 
narchs ;  and  enlargement  of  a  king's  dominion  meant  the 

*  "  rd  Si  fptivripa  rov  -vevfiaTos  fan  KO.I  etpfjvi}-" 


68  SESAME  AND   LILIES. 

same  thing  as  the  increase  of  a  private  man's  estate !  Kings 
who  think  so,  however  powerful,  can  no  more  be  the  true 
kings  of  the  nation  than  gad-flies  are  the  kings  of  a  horse  ; 
they  suck  it,  and  may  drive  it  wild,  but  do  not  guide  it. 
They,  and  their  courts,  and  their  armies  are,  if  one  could 
see  clearly,  only  a  large  species  of  marsh  mosquito,  with 
bayonet  proboscis  and  melodious,  band-mastered,  trumpeting 
in  the  summer  air ;  the  twilight  being,  perhaps,  sometimes 
fairer,  but  hardly  more  wholesome,  for  its  glittering  mists 
of  midge  companies.  The  true  kings,  meanwhile,  rule  quietly, 
if  at  all,  and  hate  ruling ;  too  many  of  them  make  "  il  gran 
refiuto ;"  and  if  they  do  not,  the  mob,  as  soon  as  they  are 
likely  to  become  useful  to  it,  is  pretty  sure  to  make  its  "  gran 
refiuto  "  of  them. 

Yet  the  visible  king  may  also  be  a  true  one,  some  day,  if 
ever  day  comes  when  he  will  estimate  his  dominion  by  the 
force  of  it, — not  the  geographical  boundaries.  It  matters 
very  little  whether  Trent  cuts  you  a  cantel  out  here,  or 
Rhine  rounds  you  a  castle  less  there.  But  it  does  matter  to 
you,  king  of  men,  whether  you  can  verily  say  to  this  man, 
"  Go,"  and  he  goeth ;  and  to  another,  "  Come,"  and  he 
conieth.  Whether  you  can  turn  your  people  as  you  can 
Trent — and  where  it  is  that  you  bid  them  come,  and  where 
go.  It  matters  to  you,  king  of  men,  whether  your  people 
hate  you,  and  die  by  you,  or  love  you,  and  live  by  you. 


OF   KINGS'  TREASURIES.  69 

You  may  measure  your  dominion  by  multitudes  better  than 
by  miles;  and  count  degrees  of  love-latitude,  not  from,  but 
to,  a  wonderfully  warm  and  infinite  equator.  Measure !  nay 
you  cannot  measure.  Who  shall  measure  the  difference 
between  the  power  of  those  who  "  do  and  teach,"  and  who 
are  greatest  in  the  kingdoms  of  earth,  as  of  heaven — and  the 
power  of  those  who  undo,  and  consume — whose  power,  at 
the  fullest,  is  only  the  power  of  the  moth  and  the  rust  ? 
Strange  !  to  think  how  the  Moth-kings  lay  up  treasures  for 
the  moth,  and  the  Rust-kings,  who  are  to  their  peoples' 
strength  as  rust  to  armour,  lay  up  treasures  for  the  rust ;  and 
the  Robber-kings,  treasures  for  the  robber;  but  how  few 
kings  have  ever  laid  up  treasures  that  needed  no  guarding — 
treasures  of  which,  the  more  thieves  there  were,  the  better ! 
Broidered  robe,  only  to  be  rent — helm  and  sword,  only  to  be 
dimmed;  jewel  and  gold,  only  to  be  scattered — there  have 
been  three  kinds  of  kings  who  have  gathered  these.  Sup 
pose  there  ever  should  arise  a  Fourth  order  of  kings,  who 
had  read,  in  some  obscure  writing  of  long  ago,  that  there 
was  a  Fourth  kind  of  treasure,  which  the  jewel  and  gold 
could  not  equal,  neither  should  it  be  valued  with  pure  gold. 
A  web  more  fair  in  the  weaving,  by  Athena's  shuttle;  an 
armour,  forged  in  diviner  fire  by  Vulcanian  force — a  gold 
only  to  be  mined  in  the  sun's  red  heart,  where  he  sets  over 
the  Delphian  cliffs  ; — deep-pictured  tissue,  impenetrable 


70  SESAME  AND  LILIES. 

armour,  potable  gold ! — the  three  great  Angels  of  Conduct, 
Toil,  and  Thought,  still  calling  to  us,  and  waiting  at  the  posts 
of  onr  doors,  to  lead  us,  if  we  would,  with  their  winged 
power,  and  guide  us,  with  their  inescapable  eyes,  by  the 
path  which  no  fowl  knoweth,  and  which  the  vulture's  eye 
has  not  seen !  Suppose  kings  should  ever  arise,  who  heard 
and  believed  this  word,  and  at  last  gathered  and  brought 
forth  treasures  of — Wisdom — for  their  people  ? 

Think  what  an  amazing  business  that  would  be !  How 
inconceivable,  in  the  state  of  our  present  national  wisdom. 
That  we  should  bring  up  our  peasants  to  a  book  exercise 
instead  of  a  bayonet  exercise ! — organize,  drill,  maintain  with 
pay,  and  good  generalship,  armies  of  thinkers,  instead  of 
armies  of  stabbers! — find  national  amusement  in  reading- 
rooms  as  well  as  rifle-grounds ;  give  prizes  for  a  fair  shot  at  a 
fact,  as  well  as  for  a  leaden  splash  on  a  target.  What  an 
absurd  idea  it  seems,  put  fairly  in  words,  that  the  wealth  of 
the  capitalists  of  civilized  nations  should  ever  come  to  sup 
port  literature  instead  of  war !  Have  yet  patience  with  me, 
while  I  read  you  a  single  sentence  out  of  the  only  book,  pro 
perly  to  be  called  a  book,  that  I  have  yet  written  myself,  the 
one  that  will  stand,  (if  anything  stand,)  surest  and  longest  of 
all  work  of  mine. 

"  It  is  one  very  awful  form  of  the  operation  of  wealth  in  Europe 
that  it  is  entirely  capitalists'  wealth  which  supports  unjust  wars.  Just 


OF   KINGS'   TREASURIES.  71 

wars  do  not  need  so  much  money  to  support  them ;  for  most  of  the 
men  who  wage  such,  wage  them  gratis ;  but  for  an  unjust  war,  men's 
bodies  and  souls  have  both  to  be  bought;  and  the  best  tools  of  war 
for  them  besides,  which  makes  such  war  costly  to  the  maximum  ;  not 
to  speak  of  the  cost  of  base  fear,  and  angry  suspicion,  between  nations 
which  have  not  grace  nor  honesty  enough  in  all  their  multitudes  to 
buy  an  hour's  peace  of  mind  with ;  as,  at  present  France  and  Eng 
land,  purchasing  of  each  other  ten  millions'  sterling  worth  of  conster 
nation,  annually  (a  remarkably  light  crop,  half  thorns  and  half  aspen 
leaves,  sown,  reaped,  and  granaried  by  the  '  science '  of  the  modern 
political  economist,  teaching  covetousness  instead  of  truth).  And,  all 
unjust  war  being  supportable,  if  not  by  pillage  of  the  enemy,  only  by 
loans  from  capitalists,  these  loans  are  repaid  by  subsequent  taxation 
of  the  peoplo,  who  appear  to  have  no  will  in  the  matter,  the  capital 
ists'  will  being  the  primary  root  of  the  war ;  but  its  real  root  is  the 
covetousness  of  the  whole  nation,  rendering  it  incapable  of  faith, 
frankness,  or  justice,  and  bringing  about,  therefore,  in  due  time,  his 
own  separate  loss  and  punishment  to  each  person." 

France  and  England  literally,  observe,  buy  panic  of  each 
other;  they  pay,  each  of  them,  for  ten  thousand  thousand 
pounds'  worth  of  terror,  a  year.  Now  suppose,  instead  of 
buying  these  ten  millions'  worth  of  panic  annually,  they 
made  up  their  minds  to  be  at  peace  with  each  other,  and  buy 
ten  millions'  worth  of  knowledge  annually ;  and  that  each 
nation  spent  its  ten  thousand  thousand  pounds  a  year  in 
founding  royal  libraries,  royal  art  galleries,  royal  museums, 


72  SESAME   AND  LILIES. 

royal  gardens,  and  places  of  rest.  Might  it  not  be  better 
somewhat  for  both  French  and  English  ? 

It  will  be  long,  yet,  before  that  comes  to  pass.  Never 
theless,  I  hope  it  will  not  be  long  before  royal  or  national 
libraries  will  be  founded  in  every  considerable  city,  with  a 
royal  series  of  books  in  them ;  the  same  series  in  every  one 
of  them,  chosen  books,  the  best  in  every  kind,  prepared  for 
that  national  series  in  the  most  perfect  way  possible ;  their 
text  printed  all  on  leaves  of  equal  size,  broad  of  margin,  and 
divided  into  pleasant  volumes,  light  in  the  hand,  beautiful, 
and  strong,  and  thorough  as  examples  of  binders'  work  ;  and 
that  these  great  libraries  will  be  accessible  to  all  clean  and 
orderly  persons  at  all  times  of  the  day  and  evening ;  strict 
law  being  enforced  for  this  cleanliness  and  quietness. 

I  conld  shape  for  you  other  plans,  for  art-galleries,  and  for 
natural  history  galleries,  and  for  many  precious,  many,  it 
seems  to  me,  needful,  things;  but  this  book  plan  is  the  easi 
est  and  needfullest,  and  would  prove  a  considerable  tonic  to 
what  we  call  our  British  constitution,  which  has  fallen  drop 
sical  of  late,  and  has  an  evil  thirst,  and  evil  hunger,  and 
wants  healthier  feeding.  You  have  got  its  corn  laws 
repealed  for  it ;  try  if  you  cannot  get  corn  laws  established 
for  it,  dealing  in  a  better  bread ; — bread  made  of  that  old 
enchanted  Arabian  grain,  the  Sesame,  which  opens  doors ; — • 
doors,  not  of  robbers',  but  of  Kings'  Treasuries. 


OF  KINGS'  TREASURIES.  73 

Friends,  the  treasuries  of  true  kings  are  the  streets  of  their 
cities ;  and  the  gold  they  gather,  which  for  others  is  as  the 
mire  of  the  streets,  changes  itself,  for  them  and  their  people, 
into  a  crystalline  pavement  for  evermore. 


LECTURE  II.-LILIES. 

OF  QUEENS'  GARDENS. 

Mo)f  Kptvov  iv  fietrui  aKavQwv^  OVTWS  fi  ir\r]ffiov  /xov."* 

IT  will,  perhaps,  be  well,  as  this  Lecture  is  the  sequel  of  one 
previously  given,  that  I  should  shortly  state  to  you  my  gene 
ral  intention  in  both.  The  questions  specially  proposed  to  you 
in  the  first,  namely,  How  and  What  to  Read,  rose  out  of  a  far 
deeper  one,  which  it  was  my  endeavour  to  make  you  propose 
earnestly  to  yourselves,  namely,  Why  to  Read.  I  want  you 
to  feel,  with  me,  that  whatever  advantages  we  possess  in  the 
present  day  in  the  diffusion  of  education  and  of  literature, 
can  only  be  rightly  used  by  any  of  us  when  we  have  appre 
hended  clearly  what  education  is  to  lead  to,  and  literature  to 
teach.  I  wish  you  to  see  that  both  well-directed  moral  train 
ing  and  well-chosen  reading  lead  to  the  possession  of  a  power 
over  the  ill-guided  and  illiterate,  which  is,  according  to  the 
measure  of  it,  in  the  truest  sense,  kingly  /  conferring  indeed 
the  purest  kingship  that  can  exist  among  men :  too  many 
other  kingships  (however  •  distinguished  by  visible  insignia 
or  material  power)  being  either  spectral,  or  tyrannous; — • 

*  Canticles  ii.  2. 


OF   QUEEXS'"  GARDENS.  75 

Spectral — that  is  to  say,  aspects  and  shadows  only  of  royalty, 
hollow  as  death,  and  which  only  the  "  Likeness  of  a  kingly 
crown  have  on ;"  or  else  tyrannous — that  is  to  say,  substi 
tuting  their  own  will  for  the  law  of  justice  and  love  by  which 
all  true  kings  rule. 

There  is,  then,  I  repeat — and  as  I  want  to  leave  this  idea 
with  you,  I  begin  with  it,  and  shall  end  with  it — only  one 
pure  kind  of  kingship;  an  inevitable  and  eternal  kind, 
crowned  or  not:  the  kingship,  namely,  which  consists  in  a 
stronger  moral  state,  and  a  truer  thoughtful  state,  than  that 
of  others ;  enabling  you,  therefore,  to  guide,  or  to  raise 
them.  Observe  that  word  "  State ;"  we  have  got  into  a  loose 
way  of  using  it.  It  means  literally  the  standing  and  stability 
of  a  thing ;  and  you  have  the  full  force  of  it  in  the  derived 
word  "  statue  " — "  the  immoveable  thing."  A  king's  majesty 
or  "  state,"  then,  and  the  right  of  his  kingdom  to  be  called  a 
state,  depends  on  the  movelessness  of  both: — without  tre 
mor,  without  quiver  of  balance ;  established  and  enthroned 
upon  a  foundation  of  eternal  law  which  nothing  can  alter  nor 
overthrow. 

Believing  that  all  literature  and  all  education  are  only  use 
ful  so  far  as  they  tend  to  confirm  this  calm,  beneficent,  and 
therefore  kingly,  power — first,  over  ourselves,  and,  through 
ourselves,  over  all  around  us,  I  am  now  going  to  ask  you  to 
consider  with  me  farther,  what  special  portion  or  kind  of 


V6  SESAME  AND  LILIES. 

this  royal  authority,  arising  out  of  noble  education,  may 
rightly  be  possessed  by  women ;  and  how  far  they  also  are 
called  to  a  true  queenly  power.  Not  in  their  households 
merely,  but  over  all  within  their  sphere.  And  in  what  sense, 
if  they  rightly  understood  and  exercised  this  royal  or  gra 
cious  influence,  the  order  and  beauty  induced  by  such  benig 
nant  power  would  justify  us  in  speaking  of  the  territories 
over  which  each  of  them  reigned,  as  "Queens'  Gardens." 

And  here,  in  the  very  outset,  we  are  met  by  a  far  deeper 
question,  which — strange  though  this  may  seem — remains 
among  many  of  us  yet  quite  undecided,  in  spite  of  its  infinite 
importance. 

We  cannot  determine  what  the  queenly  power  of  women 
should  be,  until  we  are  agreed  what  their  ordinary  power 
should  be.  We  cannot  consider  how  education  may  fit  them 
for  any  widely  extending  cfuty,  until  we  are  agreed  what  is 
their  true  constant  duty.  And  there  never  was  a  time  when 
wilder  words  were  spoken,  or  more  vain  imagination  per 
mitted,  respecting  this  question — quite  vital  to  all  social 
happiness.  The  relations  of  the  womanly  to  the  manly 
nature,  their  different  capacities  of  intellect  or  of  virtue,  seem 
never  to  have  been  yet  measured  with  entire  consent.  We 
hear  of  the  mission  and  of  the  rights  of  Woman,  as  if  these 
could  ever  be  separate  from  the  mission  and  the  rights  of 
Man  ; — as  if  she  and  her  lord  were  creatures  of  independent 


OF  QUEENS'   GARDENS.  77 

kind  and  of  irreconcileable  claim.  This,  at  least,  is  wrong. 
And  not  less  wrong — perhaps  even  more  foolishly  wrong  (for 
I  will  anticipate  thus  far  what  I  hope  to  prove) — is  the  ide 
that  woman  is  only  the  shadow  and  attendant  image  of  hei 
lord,  owing  him  a  thoughtless  and  servile  obedience,  and 
supported  altogether  in  her  weakness  by  the  pre-eminence  of 
his  fortitude. 

This,  I  say,  is  the  most  foolish  of  all  errors  respecting  her 
who  was  made  to  be  the  helpmate  of  man.  As  if  he  could 
be  helped  effectively  by  a  shadow,  or  worthily  by  a  slave ! 

Let  us  try,  then,  whether  we  cannot  get  at  some  clear  and 
harmonious  idea  (it  must  be  harmonious  if  it  is  true)  of  what 
womanly  mind  and  virtue  are  in  power  and  office,  with 
respect  to  man's  ;  and  how  their  relations,  rightly  accepted, 
aid,  and  increase,  the  vigour,  and  honour,  and  authority  of 
both. 

And  now  I  must  repeat  one  thing  I  said  in  the  last  lecture : 
namely,  that  the  first  use  of  education  was  to  enable  us  to 
consult  with  the  wisest  and  the  greatest  men  on  all  points  of 
earnest  difficulty.  That  to  use  books  rightly,  was  to  go  to 
them  for  help  :  to  appeal  to  them,  when  our  own  knowledge 
and  power  of  thought  failed  ;  to  be  led  by  them  into  wider 
sight,  purer  conception  than  our  own,  and  receive  from  them 
the  united  sentence  of  the  judges  and  councils  of  all  time, 
against  our  solitary  and  unstable  opinion. 


78  SESAME   AND  LILIES. 

Let  us  do  this  now.  Let  us  see  whether  the  greatest,  the 
wisest,  the  purest-hearted  of  all  ages  are  agreed  in  any  wise 
on  this  point:  let  us  hear  the  testimony  they  have  left 
respecting  what  they  held  to  be  the  true  dignity  of  woman, 
and  her  mode  of  help  to  man. 

And  first  let  us  take  Shakespeare. 

Note  broadly  in  the  outset,  Shakespeare  has  no  heroes  ; — 
he  has  only  heroines.  There  is  not  one  entirely  heroic  figure 
in  all  his  plays,  except  the  slight  sketch  of  Henry  the  Fifth, 
exaggerated  for  the  purposes  of  the  stage;  and  the  still 
slighter  Valentine  in  The  Two  Gentlemen  of  Verona. 
In  his  laboured  and  perfect  plays  you  have  no  hero. 
Othello  would  have  been  one,  if  his  simplicity  had  not  been 
so  great  as  to  leave  him  the  prey  of  every  base  practice 
round  him ;  but  he  is  the  only  example  even  approximating 
to  the  heroic  type.  Coriolanus — Caesar — Antony,  stand  in 
flawed  strength,  and  fall  by  their  vanities ; — Hamlet  is  indo 
lent,  and  drowsily  speculative ;  Romeo  an  impatient  boy  ;  the 
Merchant  of  Venice  languidly  submissive  to  adverse  fortune ; 
Kent,  in  King  Lear,  is  entirely  noble  at  heart,  but  too  rough 
and  unpolished  to  be  of  true  use  at  the  critical  time,  and  he 
sinks  into  the  office  of  a  servant  only.  Orlando,  no  less  noble, 
is  yet  the  despairing  toy  of  chance,  followed,  comforted, 
saved,  by  Rosalind.  Whereas  there  is  hardly  a  play  that  has 
not  a  perfect  woman  in  it,  steadfast  in  grave  hope,  and  error. 


OF  QUEENS'  GAKDENS.  79 

less  purpose;  Cordelia,  Desdemona,  Isabella,  Hermione, 
Imogen,  Queen  Katlierine,  Perdita,  Sylvia,  Viola,  Rosalind, 
Helena,  and  last,  and  perhaps  loveliest,  Virgilia,  are  all  fault 
less  ;  conceived  in  the  highest  heroic  type  of  humanity. 

Then  observe,  secondly, 

The  catastrophe  of  every  play  is  caused  always  by  the  folly 
or  fault  of  a  man ;  the  redemption,  if  there  be  any,  is  by  the 
wisdom  and  virtue  of  a  woman,  and,  failing  that,  there  is 
none.  The  catastrophe  of  King  Lear  is  owing  to  his  own 
want  of  judgment,  his  impatient  vanity,  his  misunderstanding 
of  his  children ;  the  virtue  of  his  one  true  daughter  would 
have  saved  him  from  all  the  injuries  of  the  others,  unless  he 
had  cast  her  away  from  him ;  as  it  is,  she  all  but  saves  him. 

Of  Othello  I  need  not  trace  the  tale ; — nor  the  one  weak 
ness  of  his  so  mighty  love ;  nor  the  inferiority  of  his  percep 
tive  intellect  to  that  even  of  the  second  woman  character  in 
the  play,  the  Emilia  who  dies  in  wild  testimony  against  his 
error  : — "  Oh,  murderous  coxcomb  !  What  should  such  a 
fool  Do  with  so  good  a  wife  ?" 

In  Romeo  and  Juliet,  the  wise  and  entirely  brave  strata 
gem  of  the  wife  is  brought  to  ruinous  issue  by  the  reckless 
impatience  of  her  husband.  In  Winter's  Tale,  and  in  Cym- 
beline,  the  happiness  and  existence  of  two  princely  house 
holds,  lost  through  long  years,  and  imperilled  to  the  death 
by  the  folly  and  obstinacy  of  the  husbands,  are  redeemed  at 


80  SESAME  AND   LILIES. 

last  by  the  queenly  patience  and  wisdom  of  the  wives.  In 
Measure  for  Measure,  the  injustice  of  the  judges,  and  the 
corrupt  cowardice  of  the  brother,  are  opposed  to  the  victori 
ous  truth  and  adamantine  purity  of  a  woman.  In  Coriolanus, 
the  mother's  counsel,  acted  upon  in  time,  would  have  saved 
her  son  from  all  evil;  his  momentary  forgetfulness  of  it  is 
his  ruin  ;  her  prayer  at  last  granted,  saves  him — not,  indeed, 
from  death,  but  from  the  curse  of  living  as  the  destroyer  of 
his  country. 

And  what  shall  I  say  of  Julia,  constant  against  the  fickle 
ness  of  a  lover  who  is  a  mere  wicked  child? — of  Helena, 
against  the  petulance  and  insult  of  a  careless  youth  ? — of  the 
patience  of  Hero,  the  passion  of  Beatrice,  and  the  calmly 
devoted  wisdom  of  the  "  unlessoned  girl,"  who  appears 
among  the  helplessness,  the  blindness,  and  the  vindictive 
passions  of  men,  as  a  gentle  angel,  to  save  merely  by  her 
presence,  and  defeat  the  worst  intensities  of  crime  by  her 
smile  ? 

Observe,  further,  among  all  the  principal  figures  in  Shake 
speare's  plays,  there  is  only  one  weak  woman — Ophelia ;  and 
it  is  because  she  fails  Hamlet  at  the  critical  moment,  and  is 
not,  and  cannot  in  her  nature  be,  a  guide  to  him  when  he 
needs  her  most,  that  all  the  bitter  catastrophe  follows. 
Finally,  though  there  are  three  wicked  women  among  the 
principal  figures,  Lady  Macbeth,  Regan,  and  Goneril,  they 


OF  QUEENS'  GARDENS.  81 

arc  felt  at  once  to  be  frightful  exceptions  to  the  ordinary 
laws  of  life  ;  fatal  in  their  influence  also  in  proportion  to  the 
power  for  good  which  they  have  abandoned. 

Such,  in  broad  light,  is  Shakespeare's  testimony  to  the 
position  and  character  of  women  in  human  life.  He  repre 
sents  them  as  infallibly  faithful  and  wise  counsellors, — incor- 
ruptibly  just  and  pure  examples — strong  always  to  sanctify, 
even  when  they  cannot  save. 

Not  as  in  any  wise  comparable  in  knowledge  of  the  nature 
of  man, — still  less  in  his  understanding  of  the  causes  and 
courses  of  fate, — but  only  as  the  writer  who  has  given  us  the 
broadest  view  of  the  conditions  and  modes  of  ordinary 
thought  in  modern  society,  I  ask  you  next  to  receive  the 
witness  of  Walter  Scott. 

I  put  aside  his  merely  romantic  prose  writings  as  of  no 
value :  and  though  the  early  romantic  poetry  is  very  beauti 
ful,  its  testimony  is  of  no  weight,  other  than  that  of  a  boy's 
ideal.  But  his  true  works,  studied  from  Scottish  life,  bear 
a  true  witness,  and  in  the  whole  range  of  these  there  are  but 
three  men  who  reach  the  heroic  type — Dandie  Dinmont,  Rob 
Roy,  and  Claverhouse  :  of  these,  one  is  a  border  farmer ;  ano 
ther  a  freebooter ;  the  third  a  soldier  in  a  bad  cause.  And 
these  touch  the  ideal  of  heroism  only  in  their  courage  and 
faith,  together  with  a  strong,  but  uncultivated,  or  mistakenly 

applied,  intellectual  power ;  while  his  younger  men  are  the 

4* 


82  .         SESAME  AND   LILIES. 

gentlemanly  playthings  of  fantastic  fortune,  and  only  by  aid 
(or  accident)  of  that  fortune,  survive,  not  vanquish,  the  trials 
they  involuntarily  sustain.  Of  any  disciplined,  or  consistent 
character,  earnest  in  a  purpose  wisely  conceived,  or  dealing 
with  forms  of  hostile  evil,  definitely  challenged,  and  reso 
lutely  subdued,  there  is  no  trace  in  his  conceptions  of  men. 
Whereas  in  his  imaginations  of  women, — in  the  characters  of 
Ellen  Douglas,  of  Flora  Maclvor,  Rose  Bradwardine,  Cathe 
rine  Seyton,  Diana  Vernon,  Lilias  Redgauntlet,  Alice  Bridge- 
north,  Alice  Lee,  and  Jeanie  Deans, — with  endless  varieties 
of  grace,  tenderness,  and  intellectual  power,  we  find  in  all  a 
quite  infallible  and  inevitable  sense  of  dignity  and  justice ; 
a  fearless,  instant,  and  untiring  self-sacrifice  to  even  the 
appearance  of  duty,  much  more  to  its  real  claims;  and, 
finally,  a  patient  wisdom  of  deeply  restrained  affection,  which 
does  infinitely  more  than  protect  its  objects  from  a  momen 
tary  error;  it  gradually  forms,  animates,  and  exalts  the 
characters  of  the  unworthy  lovers,  until,  at  the  close  of  the 
tale,  we  are  just  able,  and  no  more,  to  take  patience  in  hear 
ing  of  their  unmerited  success. 

So  that  in  all  cases,  with  Scott  as  with  Shakespeare,  it  is 
the  woman  who  watches  over,  teaches,  and  guides  the  youth ; 
it  is  never,  by  any  chance,  the  youth  who  watches  over  or 
educates  his  mistress. 

Next,  take,  though  more  briefly,  graver  and  deeper  ttfiti- 


OF  QUEENS'  GARDENS.  83 

mony — that  of  the  great  Italians  and  Greeks.  Fou  know 
well  the  plan  of  Dante's  great  poem — that  it  is  a  love-poem 
to  his  dead  lady,  a  song  of  praise  for  her  watch  over  his  soul. 
Stooping  only  to  pity,  never  to  love,  she  yet  saves  him  from 
destruction — saves  him  from  hell.  He  is  going  eternally 
astray  in  despair ;  she  comes  down  from  heaven  to  his  help, 
and  throughout  the  ascents  of  Paradise  is  his  teacher,  inter 
preting  for  him  the  most  difficult  truths,  divine  and  human; 
and  leading  him,  with  rebuke  upon  rebuke,  from  star  to  star. 
I  do  not  insist  upon  Dante's  conception ;  if  I  began  I 
could  not  cease :  besides,  you  might  think  this  a  wild  ima 
gination  of  one  poet's  heart.  So  I  will  rather  read  to  you 
a  few  verses  of  the  deliberate  writing  of  a  knight  of  Pisa  to 
his  living  lady,  wholly  characteristic  of  the  feeling  of  all 
the  noblest  men  of  the  thirteenth  century,  preserved  among 
many  other  such  records  of  knightly  honour  and  love,  which 
Dante  Rossetti  has  gathered  for  us  from  among  the  early 
Italian  poets. 

For  lo!    thy  law  is  passed 
That  this  my  love  should  manifestly  be 

To  serve  and  honour  thee: 
And  so  I  do;   and  my  delight  is  full, 
Accepted  for  the  servant  of  thy  rule. 

Without  almost,  I  am  all  rapturous, 
Since  thus  my  will  was  set 


84  SESAME   AND   LILIES. 

To  serve,  them  flower  of  joy,  thine  excellence: 
Nor  ever  seems  it  anything  could  rouse 

A  pain  or  regret, 

But  on  thee  dwells  mine  every  thought  and  sense: 
Considering  that  from  thee  all  virtues  spread 

As  from  a  fountain  head, — 
That  in  thy  gift  is  ivisdoiris  lest  avail. 

And  honour  without  fail ; 

With  whom  each  sovereign  good  dwells  separate, 
Fulfilling  the  perfection  of  thy  state. 

Lady,  since  I  conceived 
Thy  pleasurable  aspect  in  my  heart, 

My  life  has  leen  apart 
In  shining  brightness  and  the  place  of  truth ; 

Which  till  that  time,  good  sooth, 
Groped  among  shadows  in  a  darken'd  place, 

Where  many  hours  and  days 
It  hardly  ever  had  remember'd  good. 

But  now  my  servitude 
Is  thine,  and  I  am  full  of  joy  and  rest. 

A  man  from  a  wild  beast 
Thou  madest  me,  since  for  thy  love  I  lived. 

You  may  think,  perhaps,  a  Greek  knight  would  have  had 
a  lower  estimate  of  women  than  this  Christian  lover.  His 
own  spiritual  subjection  to  them  was  indeed  not  so  absolute ; 


OF  QUEENS'  GARDENS.  85 

but  as  regards  their  own  personal  character,  it  was  only 
because  you  could  not  have  followed  me  so  easily,  that  I 
did  not  take  the  Greek  women  instead  of  Shakespeare's; 
and  instance,  for  chief  ideal  types  of  human  beauty  and 
faith,  the  simple  mother's  and  wife's  heart  of  Andromache ; 
the  divine,  yet  rejected  wisdom  of  Cassandra;  the  playful 
kindness  and  simple  princess-life  of  happy  Nausicaa;  the 
housewifely  calm  of  that  of  Penelope,  with  its  watch  upon 
the  sea ;  the  ever  patient,  fearless,  hopelessly  devoted  piety 
of  the  sister,  and  daughter,  in  Antigone ;  the  bowing  down 
of  Iphigenia,  lamb-like  and  silent ;  and,  finally,  the  expecta 
tion  of  the  resurrection,  made  clear  to  the  soul  of  the 
Greeks  in  the  return  from  her  grave  of  that  Alcestis,  who, 
to  save  her  husband,  had  passed  calmly  through  the  bitterness 
of  death. 

Now  I  could  multiply  witness  upon  witness  of  this  kind 
upon  you  if  I  had  time.  I  would  take  Chaucer,  and  show 
you  why  he  wrote  a  Legend  of  Good  Women;  but  no 
Legend  of  Good  Men.  I  would  take  Spenser,  and  show 
you  how  all  his  fairy  knights  are  sometimes  deceived  and 
sometimes  vanquished;  but  the  soul  of  Una  is  never 
darkened,  and  the  spear  of  Britomart  is  never  broken. 
Nay,  I  could  go  back  into  the  mythical  teaching  of  the 
most  ancient  times,  and  show  you  how  the  great  people, — 
by  one  of  whose  princesses  it  was  appointed  that  the  Law- 


86  SESAME   AND   LILIES. 

giver  of  all  the  earth  should  be  educated,  rather  than  by 
his  own  kindred ; — how  that  great  Egyptian  people,  wisest 
then  of  nations,  gave  to  their  Spirit  of  Wisdom  the  form 
of  a  woman ;  and  into  her  hand,  for  a  symbol,  the  weaver's 
shuttle :  and  how  the  name  and  the  form  of  that  spirit, 
adopted,  believed,  and  obeyed  by  the  Greeks,  became  that- 
Athena  of  the  olive-helm,  and  cloudy  shield,  to  whose  faith 
you  owe,  down  to  this  date,  whatever  you  hold  most  pre 
cious  in  art,  in  literature,  or  in  types  of  national  vir 
tue. 

But  I  will  not  wander  into  this  distant  and  mythical 
element ;  I  will  only  ask  you  to  give  its  legitimate  value 
to  the  testimony  of  these  great  poets  and  men  of  the  world, 
— consistent  as  you  see  it  is  on  this  head.  I  will  ask  you 
whether  it  can  be  supposed  that  these  men,  in  the  main 
work  of  their  lives,  are  amusing  themselves  with  a  fictitious 
and  idle  view  of  the  relations  between  man  and  woman  ; — 
nay,  worse  than  fictitious  or  idle;  for  a  thing  may  be 
imaginary,  yet  desirable,  if  it  were  possible ;  but  this,  their 
ideal  of  women,  is,  according  to  our  common  idea  of  the 
marriage  relation,  wholly  undesirable.  The  woman,  we 
say,  is  not  to  guide,  nor  even  to  think,  for  herself.  The 
man  is  always  to  be  the  wiser ;  he  is  to  be  the  thinker,  the 
ruler,  the  superior  in  knowledge  and  discretion,  as  in  power. 
Is  it  not  somewhat  important  to  make  up  our  minds  on  this 


OF  QUEENS'  GARDENS.  87 

matter  ?  Are  all  these  great  men  mistaken,  or  are  we  ? 
Are  Shakespeare  and  JSschylus,  Dante  and  Homer,  merely 
dressing  dolls  for  us ;  or,  worse  than  dolls,  unnatural  visions, 
the  realization  of  which,  were  it  possible,  would  bring 
anarchy  into  all  households  and  ruin  into  all  affections  ? 
Nay,  if  you  could  suppose  this,  take  lastly  the  evidence 
of  facts,  given  by  the  human  heart  itself.  In  all  Christian 
ages  which  have  been  remarkable  for  their  purity  or  pro 
gress,  there  has  been  absolute  yielding  of  obedient  devo 
tion,  by  the  lover,  to  his  mistress.  I  say  obedient — not 
merely  enthusiastic  and  worshipping  in  imagination,  but 
entirely  subject,  receiving  from  the  beloved  woman,  how 
ever  young,  not  only  the  encouragement,  the  praise,  and 
the  reward  of  all  toil,  but,  so  far  as  any  choice  is  open,  or 
any  question  difficult  of  decision,  the  direction  of  all  toil. 
That  chivalry,  to  the  abuse  and  dishonour  of  which  are 
attributable  primarily  whatever  is  cruel  in  war,  unjust  in 
peace,  or  corrupt  and  ignoble  in  domestic  relations;  and 
to  the  original  purity  and  power  of  which  we  owe  the 
defence  alike  of  faith,  of  law,  and  of  love ; — that  chivalry, 
I  say,  in  its  very  first  conception  of  honourable  life,  assumes 
the  subjection  of  the  young  knight  to  the  command — should 
it  even  be  the  command  in  caprice — of  his  lady.  It  assumes 
this,  because  its  masters  knew  that  the  first  and  necessary 
impulse  of  every  truly  taught  and  knightly  heart  is  this 


88  SESAME    AX1)   LILIES. 

of  blind  service  to  its  lady :  that  where  that  true  faitlt  and 
captivity  are  not,  all  wayward  and  wicked  passion  must  be  ; 
and  that  in  this  rapturous  obedience  to  the  single  love  of 
his  youth,  is  the  sanctification  of  all  man's  strength,  and 
the  continuance  of  all  his  purposes.  And  this,  not  because 
such  obedience  would  be  safe,  or  honourable,  were  it  ever 
rendered  to  the  unworthy ;  but  because  it  ought  to  be 
impossible  for  every  noble  youth — it  is  impossible  for  every 
one  rightly  trained — to  love  any  one  whose  gentle  counsel 
he  cannot  trust,  or  whose  prayerful  command  he  can  hesitate 
to  obey. 

I  do  not  insist  by  any  farther  argument  on  this,  for  I 
think  it  should  commend  itself  at  once  to  your  knowledge 
of  what  has  been  and  to  your  feeling  of  what  should  be. 
You  cannot  think  that  the  buckling  on  of  the  knight's 
armour  by  his  lady's  hand  was  a  mere  caprice  of  romantic 
fashion.  It  is  the  type  of  an  eternal  truth — that  the  soul's 
armour  is  never  well  set  to  the  heart  unless  a  woman's 
hand  has  braced  it ;  and  it  is  only  when  she  braces  it  loosely 
that  the  honour  of  manhood  fails.  Know  you  not  those 
lovely  lines — I  would  they  were  learned  by  all  youthful 
ladies  of  England  : — 

"'Ah  wasteful  woman  1    she  who  may 
On  her  sweet  self  set  her  own  price, 
Knowing  he  cannot  choose  but  pay — 


OF   QUEENS5   GARDENS.  89 

How  has  she  cheapen'd  Paradise ! 
How  given  for  nought  her  priceless  gift, 
How  spoiled  the  bread  and  spill' d  the  wine, 
Which,  spent  with  due,  respective  thrift, 
Had  made  brutes  men,  and  men  divine  I  "  * 

Thus  much,  then,  respecting  the  relations  of  lovers  I 
believe  you  will  accept.  But  what  we  too  often  doubt  is 
the  fitness  of  the  continuance  of  such  a  relation  throughout 
the  whole  of  human  life.  We  think  it  right  in  the  lover 
and  mistress,  not  in  the  husband  and  wife.  That  is  to  say, 
we  think  that  a  reverent  and  tender  duty  is  due  to  one 
whose  affection  we  still  doubt,  and  whose  character  we  as 
yet  do  but  partially  and  distantly  discern  ;  and  that  this 
reverence  and  duty  are  to  be  withdrawn  when  the  affection 
has  become  wholly  and  limitlessly  our  own,  and  the  charac 
ter  has  been  so  sifted  and  tried  that  we  fear  not  to  entrust 
it  with  the  happiness  of  our  lives.  Do  you  not  see  how 
ignoble  this  is,  as  well  as  how  unreasonable?  Do  you  not 
feel  that  marriage — when  it  is  marriage  at  all,— is  only  the 
seal  which  marks  the  vowed  transition  of  temporary  into 
untiring  service,  and  of  fitful  into  eternal  love  ? 

But  how,  you  will  ask,  is  the  idea  of  this  guiding  function 
of  the  woman  reconcileable  with  a  true  wifely  subjection? 
Simply  in  that  it  is  a  guiding,  not  a  determining,  function. 
*  Coventry  Patmore. 


90  SESAME   AND   LILIES. 

Let  me  try  to  show  you  briefly  how  these  powers  seem  to  be 
rightly  distinguishable. 

We  are  foolish,  and  without  excuse  foolish,  in  speaking  of 
the  "  superiority  "  of  one  sex  to  the  other,  as  if  they  could  be 
compared  in  similar  things.  Each  has  what  the  other  has 
not :  each  completes  the  other,  and  is  completed  by  the 
other :  they  are  in  nothing  alike,  and  the  happiness  and  per 
fection  of  both  depends  on  each  asking  and  receiving  from 
the  other  what  the  other  only  can  give. 

Now  their  separate  characters  are  briefly  these.  The  man's 
power  is  active,  progressive,  defensive.  He  is  eminently  the 
doer,  the  creator,  the  discoverer,  the  defender.  His  intellect 
is  for  speculation  and  invention;  his  energy  for  adventure, 
for  war,  and  for  conquest,  wherever  war  is  just,  wherever 
conquest  necessary.  But  the  woman's  power  is  for  rule,  not 
for  battle, — and  her  intellect  is  not  for  invention  or  creation, 
but  for  sweet  ordering,  arrangement,  and  decision.  She  sees 
the  qualities  of  things,  their  claims  and  their  places.  Her 
great  function  is  Praise :  she  enters  into  no  contest,  but 
infallibly  judges  the  crown  of  contest.  By  her  office,  and 
place,  she  is  protected  from  all  danger  and  temptation.  The 
man,  in  his  rough  work  in  open  world,  must  encounter  all 
peril  and  trial : — to  him,  therefore,  the  failure,  the  offence, 
the  inevitable  error:  often  he  must  be  wounded,  or  subdued, 
often  misled,  and  always  hardened.  But  he  guards  the 


OF  QUEENS'  GARDENS.  91 

woman  from  all  this ;  within  his  house,  as  ruled  by  her,  unless 
she  herself  has  sought  it,  need  enter  no  danger,  no  tempta 
tion,  no  cause  of  error  or  offence.  This  is  the  true  nature 
of  home — it  is  the  place  of  Peace  ;  the  shelter,  not  only  from 
all  irjury,  but  from  all  terror,  doubt,  and  division.  In  so  far 
as  it  is  not  this,  it  is  not  home  ;  so  far  as  the  anxieties  of  the  * 
outer  life  penetrate  into  it,  and  the  inconsistently-minded, 
unknown,  unloved,  or  hostile  society  of  the  outer  world  is 
allowed  by  either  husband  or  wife  to  cross  the  threshold,  it 
ceases  to  be  home  ;  it  is  then  only  a  part  of  that  outer  world 
which  you  have  roofed  over,  and  lighted  fire  in.  But  so  far 
as  it  is  a  sacred  place,  a  vestal  temple,  a  temple  of  the  hearth 
watched  over  by  Household  Gods,  before  whose  faces  none 
may  come  but  those  whom  they  can  receive  with  love, — so 
far  as  it  is  this,  and  roof  and  fire  are  types  only  of  a  nobler 
shade  and  light, — shade  as  of  the  rock  in  a  weary  land,  and 
light  as  of  the  Pharos  in  the  stormy  sea  ; — so  far  it  vindicates 
the  name,  and  fulfils  the  praise,  of  home. 

And  wherever  a  true  wife  comes,  this  home  is  always 
round  her.  The  stars  only  may  be  over  her  head ;  the  glow 
worm  in  the  night-cold  grass  may  be  the  only  fire  at  her 
foot :  but  home  is  yet  wherever  she  is ;  and  for  a  noble 
woman  it  stretches  far  round  her,  better  than  ceiled  with 
cedar,  or  painted  with  vermilion,  shedding  its  quiet  light  far, 
for  those  who  else  were  homeless. 


92  SESAME  AND   LILIES. 

This,  then,  I  believe  to  be, — will  you  not  admit  it  to  be, — • 
the  woman's  true  place  and  power?  But  do  not  you  see 
that  to  fulfil  this,  she  must — as  far  as  one  can  use  such  terms 
of  a  human  creature — be  incapable  of  error  ?  So  far  as  she 
rules,  all  must  be  right,  or  nothing  is.  She  must  be  endur- 
ingly,  incorruptibly  good ;  instinctively,  infallibly  wise — wise, 
not  for  self-development,  but  for  self-renunciation :  wise,  not 
that  she  may  set  herself  above  her  husband,  but  that  she 
may  never  fail  from  his  side  :  wise,  not  with  the  narrowness 
of  insolent  and  loveless  pride,  but  with  the  passionate  gentle 
ness  of  an  infinitely  variable,  because  infinitely  applicable, 
modesty  of  service — the  true  changefulness  of  woman.  In 
that  great  sense — "  La  donna  e  mobile,"  not  "  Qual  pium'  al 
vento;"  no,  nor  yet  "Variable  as  the  shade,  by  the  light 
quivering  aspen  made ;"  but  variable  as  the  light,  manifold  in 
fair  and  serene  division,  that  it  may  take  the  colour  of  all  that 
it  falls  upon,  and  exalt  it. 

II.  I  have  been  trying,  thus  far,  to  show  you  what  should 
be  the  place,  and  what  the  power  of  woman.  N"ow,  secondly, 
we  ask,  What  kind  of  education  is  to  fit  her  for  these  ? 

And  if  you  indeed  think  this  a  true  conception  of  her  office 
and  dignity,  it  will  not  be  difficult  to  trace  the  course  of 
education  which  would  fit  her  for  the  one,  and  raise  her  to 
the  other. 

The  first  of  our  duties  to  her — no  thoughtful  persons  now 


OF  QUEENS'  GARDENS.  93 

d?-abt  this, — is  to  secure  for  her  such  physical  training  and 
exercise  as  may  confirm  her  health,  and  perfect  her  beauty : 
the  highest  refinement  of  that  beauty  being  unattainable 
without  splendour  of  activity  and  of  delicate  strength.  To 
perfect  her  beauty,  I  say,  and  increase  its  power ;  it  cannot 
be  too  powerful,  nor  shed  its  sacred  light  too  far:  only 
remember  that  all  physical  freedom  is  vain  to  produce  beauty 
without  a  corresponding  freedom  of  heart.  There  are  two 
passages  of  that  poet  who  is  distinguished,  it  seems  to  me, 
from  all  others — not  by  power,  but  by  exquisite  Tightness — 
which  point  you  to  the  source,  and  describe  to  you,  in  a  few 
syllables,  the  completion  of  womanly  beauty.  I  will  read  the 
introductory  stanzas,  but  the  last  is  the  one  I  wish  you 
specially  to  notice : 

"  Three  years  she  grew  in  sun  and  shower, 
Then  Nature  said,  a  lovelier  flower 

On  earth  was  never  sown. 
This  child  I  to  myself  will  take ; 
She  shall  be  mine,  and  I  will  make 

A  lady  of  my  own. 

"  Myself  will  to  my  darling  be 
Both  law  and  impulse ;  and  with  me 

The  girl,  in  rock  and  plain, 
In  earth  and  heaven,  in  glade  and  bower, 


91  SESAME  AND  LILIES. 

Shall  feel  an  overseeing  power 
To  kindle,  or  restrain. 

u  The  floating  clouds  their  state  shall  lend 
To  her,  for  her  the  willow  bend ; 

Nor  shall  she  fail  to  see 
Even  in  the  motions  of  the  storm, 
Grace  that  shall  mould  the  maiden's  form 
,  By  silent  sympathy. 

"  And  vital  feelings  of  delight 
Shall  rear  her  form  to  stately  height,—- 

Her  virgin  bosom  swell. 
Such  thoughts  to  Lucy  I  will  give, 
While  she  and  I  together  live, 
Here  in  this  happy  delL" 

"  Vital  feelings  of  delight,"  observe.  There  are  deadly 
feelings  of  delight ;  but  the  natural  ones  are  vital,  necessary 
to  very  life. 

And  they  must  be  feelings  of  delight,  if  they  are  to  be 
vital.  Do  not  think  you  can  make  a  girl  lovely,  if  you  do  not 
make  her  happy.  There  is  not  one  restraint  you  put  on  a 
good  girl's  nature — there  is  not  one  check  you  give  to  her 
instincts  of  affection  or  of  effort — which  will  not  be  indelibly 
written  on  her  features,  with  a  hardness  which  is  all  the  more 
painful  because  it  takes  away  the  brightness  from  the 


OF  QUEENS'  GARDENS.  95 

eyes  of  innocence,  and  the  charm  from  the  brow  of  vir 
tue. 

This  for  the  means :  now  note  the  end.  Take  from  the 
same  poet,  in  two  lines,  a  perfect  description  of  womanly 
beauty — 

"  A  countenance  in  which  did  meet 
Sweet  records,  promises  as  sweet." 

The  perfect  loveliness  of  a  woman's  countenance  can  only 
consist  in  that  majestic  peace,  which  is  founded  in  the 
memory  of  happy  and  useful  years, — full  of  sweet  records ; 
and  from  the  joining  of  this  with  that  yet  more  majestic 
childishness,  which  is  still  full  of  change  and  promise; — 
opening  always — modest  at  once,  and  bright,  with  hope  of 
better  things  to  be  won,  and  to  be  bestowed.  There  is  no 
old  age  where  there  is  still  that  promise — it  is  eternal  youth. 

Thus,  then,  you  have  first  to  mould  her  physical  frame, 
and  then,  as  the  strength  she  gains  will  permit  you,  to  fill 
and  temper  her  mind  with  all  knowledge  and  thoughts  which 
tend  to  confirm  its  natural  instincts  of  justice,  and  refine  its 
natural  tact  of  love. 

All  such  knowledge  should  be  given  her  .is  may  enable  he? 
to  understand,  and  even  to  aid,  the  work  of  men  :  and  yet  it 
should  be  given,  not  as  knowledge, — not  as  if  it  were,  or 
could  be,  for  her  an  object  to  know ;  but  only  to  feel,  and  to 


96  SESAME  AND  LILIES. 

judge.  It  is  of  DO  moment,  as  a  matter  of  pride  or  perfect 
ness  in  herself,  whether  she  knows  many  languages  or  one 
but  it  is  of  the  utmost,  that  she  should  be  able  to  show 
kindness  to  a  stranger,  and  to  understand  the  sweetness  of  a 
stranger's  tongue.  It  is  of  no  moment  to  her  own  worth  or 
dignity  that  she  should  be  acquainted  with  this  science  or 
that ;  but  it  is  of  the  highest  that  she  should  be  trained  in 
habits  of  accurate  thought ;  that  she  should  understand  the 
meaning,  the  inevitableness,  and  the  loveliness  of  natural 
laws,  and  follow  at  least  some  one  path  of  scientific  attain 
ment,  as  far  as  to  the  threshold  of  that  bitter  Valley  of  Humi 
liation,  into  which  only  the  wisest  and  bravest  of  men  can 
descend,  owning  themselves  for  ever  children,  gathering  peb 
bles  on  a  boundless  shore.  It  is  of  little  consequence  how 
many  positions  of  cities  she  knows,  or  how  many  dates  of 
events,  or  how  many  names  of  celebrated  persons — it  is  not 
the  object  of  education  to  turn  a  woman  into  a  dictionary ; 
but  it  is  deeply  necessary  that  she  should  be  taught  to  enter 
with  her  whole  personality  into  the  history  she  reads ;  to 
picture  the  .passages  of  it  vitally  in  her  own  bright  imagina 
tion  ;  to  apprehend,  with  her  fine  instincts,  the  pathetic  cir 
cumstances  and  dramatic  relations,  which  the  historian  too 
often  only  eclipses  by  his  reasoning,  and  disconnects  by  hia 
arrangement :  it  is  for  her  to  trace  the  hidden  equities  of 
divine  reward,  and  catch  sight,  through  the  darkness,  of  the 


OF  QUEENS'  GARDENS.  97 

fateful  threads  of  woven  fire  that  connect  error  with  its  retri 
bution.  But,  chiefly  of  all,  she  is  to  be  taught  to  extend  the 
limits  of  her  sympathy  with  respect  to  that  history  which  is 
being  for  ever  determined,  as  the  moments  pass  in  which  she 
draws  her  peaceful  breath ;  and  to  the  contemporary  cala 
mity  which,  were  it  but  rightly  mourned  by  her,  would  recur 
no  more  hereafter.  She  is  to  exercise  herself  in  imagining 
what  would  be  the  effects  upon  her  mind  and  conduct,  if  she 
were  daily  brought  into  the  presence  of  the  suffering  which 
is  not  the  less  real  because  shut  from  her  sight.  She  is  to  be 
taught  somewhat  to  understand  the  nothingness  of  the  pro 
portion  which  that  little  world  in  which  she  lives  and  loves, 
bears  to  the  world  in  which  God  lives  and  loves ;— and 
solemnly  she  is  to  be  taught  to  strive  that  her  thoughts  of 
piety  may  not  be  feeble  in  proportion  to  the  number  they 
embrace,  nor  her  prayer  more  languid  than  it  is  for  the  mo 
mentary  relief  from  pain  of  her  husband  or  her  child,  when 
it  is  uttered  for  the  multitudes  of  those  who  have  none  to 
love  them, — and  is  "for  all  who  are  desolate  and  oppressed." 
Thus  far,  I  think,  I  have  had  your  concurrence  ;  perhaps 
you  will  not  be  with  me  in  what  I  believe  is  most  needful  for 
me  to  say.  There  is  one  dangerous  science  for  women — one 
which  let  them  indeed  beware  how  they  profanely  touch — 
that  of  theology.  Strange,  and  miserably  strange,  that  while 

they  are  modest  enough  to  doubt  their  powers,  and  pause  at 

5 


98  SESAME  AND  LILIES. 

the  threshold  of  sciences  where  every  step  is  demonstrable 
and  sure,  they  will  plunge  headlong,  and  without  one  thought 
of  incompetency,  into  that  science  in  which  the  greatest  men 
have  trembled,  and  the  wisest  erred.  Strange,  that  they  will 
complacently  and  pridefully  bind  up  whatever  vice  or  folly 
there  is  in  them,  whatever  arrogance,  petulance,  or  blind 
incomprehensiveness,  into  one  bitter  bundle  of  consecrated 
myrrh.  Strange,  in  creatures  born  to  be  Love  visible,  that 
where  they  can  know  least,  they  will  condemn  first,  and  think 
to  recommend  themselves  to  their  Master  by  scrambling  up 
the  steps  of  His  judgment-throne,  to  divide  it  with  Him. 
Most  strange,  that  they  should  think  they  were  led  by  the 
Spirit  of  the  Comforter  into  habits  of  mind  which  have 
become  in  them  the  unmixed  elements  of  home  discomfort ; 
and  that  they  dare  to  turn  the  Household  Gods  of  Christi 
anity  into  ugly  idols  of  their  own — spiritual  dolls,  for  them 
to  dress  according  to  their  caprice ;  and  from  which  their 
husbands  must  turn  away  in  grieved  contempt,  lest  they 
should  be  shrieked  at  for  breaking  them. 

I  believe,  then,  with  this  exception,  that  a  girl's  education 
should  be  nearly,  in  its  course  and  material  of  study,  the 
same  as  a  boy's ;  but  quite  differently  directed.  A  woman, 
in  any  rank  of  life,  ought  to  know  whatever  her  husband  is 
likely  to  know,  but  to  know  it  in  a  different  way.  His  com 
mand  of  it  should  be  foundational  and  progressive,  hers, 


OF  QUEENS'  GARDENS.  99 

general  and  accomplished  for  daily  and  helpful  use.  Not  but 
that  it  would  often  be  wiser  in  men  to  learn  things  in  a 
womanly  sort  of  way,  for  present  use,  and  to  seek  for  the 
discipline  and  training  of  their  mental  powers  in  such 
branches  of  study  as  will  be  afterwards  fittest  for  social 
service ;  but,  speaking  broadly,  a  man  ought  to  know  any 
language  or  science  he  learns,  thoroughly,  while  a  woman 
ought  to  know  the  same  language,  or  science,  only  so  far  as 
may  enable  her  to  sympathise  in  her  husband's  pleasures, 
and  in  those  of  his  best  friends. 

Yet,  observe,  with  exquisite  accuracy  as  far  as  she  reaches. 
There  is  a  wide  difference  between  elementary  knowledge 
and  superficial  knowledge — between  a  firm  beginning,  and  a 
feeble  smattering.  A  woman  may  always  help  her  husband 
by  what  she  knows,  however  little  ;  by  what  she  half-knows, 
or  mis-knows,  she  will  only  teaze  him. 

And,  indeed,  if  there  were  to  be  any  difference  between  a 
girl's  education  and  a  boy's,  I  should  say  that  of  the  two  the 
girl  should  be  earlier  led,  as  her  intellect  ripens  faster,  into 
deep  and  serious  subjects  ;  and  that  her  range  of  literature 
should  be,  not  more,  but  less  frivolous,  calculated  to  add  the 
qualities  of  patience  and  seriousness  to  her  natural  poignancy 
of  thought  and  quickness  of  wit ;  and  also  to  keep  her  in  a 
lofty  and  pure  element  of  thought.  I  enter  not  now  into  any 
question  of  choice  of  books  ;  only  be  sure  that  her  books  are 


100  SESAME   AND  LILIES. 

not  heaped  up  in  her  lap  as  they  fall  out  of  the  package  of 
the  circulating  library,  wet  with  the  last  and  lightest  spray  of 
the  fountain  of  folly. 

Or  even  of  the  fountain  of  wit ;  for  with  respect  to  that 
sore  temptation  of  novel-reading,  it  is  not  the  badness  of  a 
novel  that  we  should  dread,  but  its  over-wrought  interest 
The  weakest  romance  is  not  so  stupifying  as  the  lower  forms 
of  religious  exciting  literature,  and  the  worst  romance  is 
not  so  corrupting  as  false  history,  false  philosophy,  or  false 
political  essays.  But  the  best  romance  becomes  dangerous, 
if,  by  its  excitement,  it  renders  the  ordinary  course  of  life 
uninteresting,  and  increases  the  morbid  thirst  for  useless 
acquaintance  with  scenes  in  which  we  shall  never  be  called 
upon  to  act. 

I  speak  therefore  of  good  novels  only ;  and  our  modern 
literature  is  particularly  rich  in  types  of  such.  Well  read, 
indeed,  these  books  have  serious  use,  being  nothing  less  than 
treatises  on  moral  anatomy  and  chemistry ;  studies  of  human 
nature  in  the  elements  of  it.  But  I  attach  little  weight  to 
this  function:  they  are  hardly  ever  read  with  earnestness 
enough  to  permit  them  to  fulfil  it.  The  utmost  they  usually 
do  is  to  enlarge  somewhat  the  charity  of  a  kind  reader,  or  the 
bitterness  of  a  malicious  one ;  for  each  will  gather,  from  the 
novel,  food  for  her  own  disposition.  Those  who  are  naturally 
proud  and  envious  will  learn  from  Thackeray  to  despise 


OF  QUEENS'  GARDENS.  101 

humanity;  those  who  are  naturally  gentle,  to  pity  it;  those 
who  are  naturally  shallow,  to  laugh  at  it.  So,  also,  there 
might  be  a  serviceable  power  in  novels  to  bring  before  us,  in 
vividness,  a  human  truth  which  we  had  before  dimly  con 
ceived  ;  but  the  temptation  to  picturesqueness  of  statement 
is  so  great,  that  often  the  best  writers  of  fiction  cannot  resist 
it;  and  our  views  are  rendered  so  violent  and  one-sided,  that 
their  vitality  is  rather  a  harm  than  good. 

Without,  however,  venturing  here  on  any  attempt  at 
decision  how  much  novel-reading  should  be  allowed,  let  me 
at  least  clearly  assert  this,  that  whether  novels,  or  poetry,  or 
history  be  read,  they  should  be  chosen,  not  for  what  is  out 
of  them,  but  for  what  is  in  them.  The  chance  and  scattered 
evil  that  may  here  and  there  haunt,  or  hide  itself  in,  a 
powerful  book,  never  does  any  harm  to  a  noble  girl ;  but  the 
emptiness  of  an  author  oppresses  her,  and  his  amiable  folly 
degrades  her.  And  if  she  can  have  access  to  a  good  library 
of  old  and  classical  books,  there  need  be  no  choosing  at  all. 
Keep  the  modern  magazine  and  novel  out  of  your  girl's  way : 
turn  her  loose  into  the  old  library  every  wet  day,  and  let  her 
alone.  She  will  find  what  is  good  for  her ;  you  cannot :  for 
there  is  just  this  difference  between  the  making  of  a  girl's 
character  and  a  boy's — you  may  chisel  a  boy  into  shnpe,  as 
you  would  a  rock,  or  hammer  him  into  it,  if  he  be  of  a  better 
kind,  as  you  would  a  piece  of  bronze.  But  you  cannot 


102  SESAME   AND  LILIES. 

hammer  a  girl  into  anything.  She  grows  as  a  flower  does,-— 
she  will  wither  without  sun ;  she  will  decay  in  her  sheath,  as 
the  narcissus  (Joes,  if  you  do  not  give  her  air  enough ;  she 
may  fall,  and  defile  her  head  in  dust,  if  you  leave  her  without 
help  at  some  moments  of  her  life;  but  you  cannot  fetter 
her ;  she  must  take  her  own  fair  form  and  way,  if  she  take 
any,  and  in  mind  as  in  body,  must  have  always 

"  Her  household  motions  light  and  free 
And  steps  of  virgin  liberty." 

Let  her  loose  in  the  library,  I  say,  as  you  do  a  fawn 
in  a  field.  It  knows  the  bad  weeds  twenty  times  better 
than  you ;  and  the  good  ones  too,  and  will  eat  some  bitter 
and  prickly  ones,  good  for  it,  which  you  had  not  the  slightest 
thought  were  good. 

Then,  in  art,  keep  the  finest  models  before  her,  and  let  her 
practice  in  all  accomplishments  be  accurate  and  thorough, 
so  as  to  enable  her  to  understand  more  than  she  accomplishes. 
I  say  the  finest  models — that  is  to  say,  the  truest,  simplest, 
usefullest.  Note  those  epithets  ;  they  will  range  through  all 
the  arts.  Try  them  in  music,  where  you  might  think  them 
the  least  applicable.  I  say  the  truest,  that  in  which  the  notes 
most  closely  and  faithfully  express  the  meaning  of  the  words, 
or  the  character  of  intended  emotion ;  again,  the  simplest, 
that  in  which  the  meaning  and  melody  are  attained  with  the 


OF  QUEENS'  GARDENS.  103 

fewest  and  most  significant  notes  possible;  and,  finally,  the 
nsefullest,  that  music  which  makes  the  best  words  most 
beautiful,  which  enchants  them  in  our  memories  each  with  its 
own  glory  of  sound,  and  which  applies  them  closest  to  the 
heart  at  the  moment  we  need  them. 

And  not  only  in  the  material  and  in  the  course,  but  yet 
more  earnestly  in  the  spirit  of  it,  let  a  girl's  education  be  as 
serious  as  a  boy's.  You  bring  up  your  girls  as  if  they  were 
meant  for  sideboard  ornaments,  and  then  complain  of  their 
frivolity.  Give  them  the  same  advantages  that  you  give 
their  brothers — appeal  to  the  same  grand  instincts  of  virtue 
in  them;  teach  them  also  that  courage  and  truth  are  the 
pillars  of  their  being:  do  you  think  that  they  would  not 
answer  that  appeal,  brave  and  true  as  they  are  even  now, 
when  you  know  that  there  is  hardly  a  girl's  school  in  this 
Christian  kingdom  where  the  children's  courage  or  sincerity 
would  be  thought  of  half  so  much  importance  as  their  way 
of  coming  in  at  a  door;  and  when  the  whole  system  of 
society,  as  respects  the  mode  of  establishing  them  in  life,  is 
one  rotten  plague  of  cowardice  and  imposture — cowardice,  in 
not  daring  to  let  them  live,  or  love,  except  as  their  neigh 
bours  choose  ;  and  imposture,  in  bringing,  for  the  purpose  of 
onr  own  pride,  the  full  glow  of  the  world's  worst  vanity  upon 
a  girl's  eyes,  at  the  very  period  when  the  whole  happiness 
of  her  future  existence  depends  upon  her  remaining  undazzled  ? 


104  SESAME  AND   LILIES. 

And  give  them,  lastly,  not  only  noble  teachings,  but  noblo 
teachers.  You  consider  somewhat,  before  you  send  your 
boy  to  school,  what  kind  of  a  man  the  master  is ; — whatso 
ever  kind  of  man  he  is,  you  at  least  give  him  full  authority 
over  your  son,  and  show  some  respect  to  him  yourself;  if  he 
cornes  to  dine  with  you,  you  do  not  put  him  at  a  side  table  ; 
you  know  also  that,  at  his  college,  your  child's  immediate 
tutor  will  be  under  the  direction  of  some  still  higher  tutor,  fo? 
whom  you  have  absolute  reverence.  You  do  not  treat  the  Dean 
of  Christ  Church  or  the  Master  of  Trinity  as  your  inferiors. 

But  what  teachers  do  you  give  your  girls,  and  what  reve 
rence  do  you  show  to  the  teachers  you  have  chosen  ?  Is  a 
girl  likely  to  think  her  own  conduct,  or  her  own  intellect,  of 
much  importance,  when  you  trust  the  entire  formation  of 
her  character,  moral  and  intellectual,  to  a  person  whom  you 
let  your  servants  treat  with  less  respect  than  they  do  your 
housekeeper  (as  if  the  soul  of  your  child  were  a  less  charge 
than  jams  and  groceries),  and  whom  you  yourself  think  you 
confer  an  honour  upon  by  letting  her  sometimes  sit  in  the 
drawing-room  in  the  evening  ? 

Thus,  then,  of  literature  as  her  help,  and  thus  of  art. 
There  is  one  more  help  which  she  cannot  do  without — one 
which,  alone,  has  sometimes  done  more  than  all  other  in 
fluences  besides, — the  help  of  wild  and  fair  nature.  Hear 
this  of  the  education  of  Joan  of  Arc : 


OF   QUEENS'   GAKDENS.  105 

"  The  education  of  this  poor  girl  was  mean  according  to  the  present 
standard ;  was  ineffably  grand,  according  to  a  purer  philosophic  stand 
ard  ;  and  only  not  good  for  our  age,  because  for  us  it  would  be  unat 
tainable.  *  *  * 

"  Next  after  her  spiritual  advantages,  she  owed  most  to  the  advan 
tages  of  her  situation.  The  fountain  of  Domremy  was  on  the  brink 
of  a  boundless  forest ;  and  it  was  haunted  to  that  degree  by  fairies, 
that  the  parish  priest  (cure)  was  obliged  to  read  mass  there  once  a 
year,  in  order  to  keep  them  in  any  decent  bounds.  *  *  * 

"But  the  forests  of  Domremy — those  were  the  glories  of  the  land  , 
for  in  them  abode  mysterious  powers  and  ancient  secrets  that  towered 
into  tragic  strength.  'Abbeys  there  were,  and  abbey  windows,' — 
'like  Moorish  temples  of  the  Hindoos,'  that  exercised  even  princely 
power  both  in  Touraine  and  in  the  German  Diets.  These  had  their 
sweet  bells  that  pierced  the  forests  for  many  a  league  at  matins  or 
vespers,  and  each  its  own  dreamy  legend.  Few  enough,  and  scat 
tered  enough,  were  these  abbeys,  so  as  in  no  degree  to  disturb  the 
deep  solitude  of  the  region ;  yet  many  enough  to  spread  a  network 
or  awning  of  Christian  sanctity  over  what  else  might  have  seemed  a 
heathen  wilderness."  * 

N"ow,  you  cannot,  indeed,  have  here  in  England,  woods 

Ighteen  miles  deep  to  the  centre ;  but  you  can,  perhaps, 

keep  a  fairy  or  two  for  your  children  yet,  if  you  wish  to  keep 

them.     But  do  you  wish  it  ?     Suppose  you  had  each,  at  the 

*  "Joan  of  Arc:  in  reference  to  M.  Michelet's  History  of  France."    D* 

Quinoey's  "Works.    YoL  iiL  p.  217. 

5* 


106  SESAME   AND   LILIES. 

back  of  your  houses,  a  garden,  large  enough,  for  your  chil 
dren  to  play  in,  with  just  as  much  lawn  as  would  give  them 
room  to  run, — no  more — and  that  you  could  not  change  your 
abode  ;  but  that,  if  you  chose,  you  could  double  your  income, 
or  quadruple  it,  by  digging  a  coal  shaft  in  the  middle  of 
the  lawn,  and  turning  the  flower-beds  into  heaps  of  coke. 
Would  you  do  it  ?  I  think  not.  I  can  tell  you,  you  would 
be  wrong  if  you  did,  though  it  gave  you  income  sixty-fold 
instead  of  four-fold. 

Yet  this  is  what  you  are  doing  with  all  England.  The 
whole  country  is  but  a  little  garden,  not  more  than  enough 
for  your  children  to  run  on  the  lawns  of,  if  you  would  let 
them  all  run  there.  And  this  little  garden  you  will  turn  into 
furnace-ground,  and  fill  with  heaps  of  cinders,  if  you  can ; 
and  those  children  of  yours,  not  you,  will  suffer  for  it.  For 
the  fairies  will  not  be  all  banished ;  there  are  fairies  of  the 
furnace  as  of  the  wood,  and  their  first  gifts  seem  to  be 
"  sharp  arrows  of  the  mighty ;"  but  their  last  gifts  are  "  coals 
of  juniper." 

And  yet  I  cannot — though  there  is  no  part  of  my  subject 
that  I  feel  more — press  this  upon  you  ;  for  we  made  so  little 
use  of  the  power  of  nature  while  we  had  it  that  we  shall 
hardly  feel  what  we  have  lost.  Just  on  the  other  side  of  the 
Mersey  you  have  your  Snowdon,  and  your  Menai  Straits, 
and  that  mighty  granite  rock  beyond  the  moors  of  Anglesea, 


OF  QUEENS'  GARDENS.  107 

splendid  in  its  heathery  crest,  and  foot  planted  in  the  deep 
sea,  once  thought  of  as  sacred — a  divine  promontory,  looking 
westward ;  the  Holy  Head  or  Headland,  still  riot  without 
awe  when  its  red  light  glares  first  through  storm.  These 
are  the  hills,  and  these  the  bays  and  IO\U.Q  inlets,  which, 
among  the  Greeks,  would  have  been  always  loved,  always 
fateful  in  influence  on  the  national  mind.  That  Snowdon  is 
your  Parnassus ;  but  where  are  its  Muses  ?  That  Holyhead 
mountain  is  your  Island  of  ./Egina,  but  where  is  its  Temple 
to  Minerva  ? 

Shall  I  read  you  what  the  Christian  Minerva  had  achieved 
under  the  shadow  of  our  Parnassus,  up  to  the  year  1848  ? — 
Here  is  a  little  account  of  a  Welsh  school,  from  page  261  of 
the  Report  on  Wales,  published  by  the  Committee  of  Coun 
cil  on  Education.  This  is  a  school  close  to  a  town  contain 
ing  5,000  persons  : — 

"  I  then  called  up  a  larger  class,  most  of  whom  had  recently  come 
to  the  school.  Three  girls  repeatedly  declared  they  had  never  heard 
of  Christ,  and  two  that  they  had  never  heard  of  God.  Two  out  of  six 
thought  Christ  was  on  earth  now  ('they  might  have  had  a  worse 
thought,  perhaps'),  three  knew  nothing  about  the  crucifixion.  Four 
out  of  seven  did  not  know  the  names  of  the  months,  nor  the  number 
of  days  in  a  year.  They  had  no  notion  of  addition  beyond  two  and 
two,  or  three  and  three ;  their  minds  were  perfect  blanks." 

Oh  ye  women  of  England !  from  the  Princess  of  that  Wales 


108  SESAME   AND   LILIES. 

to  the  simplest  of  you,  do  not  think  your  own  children  can 
be  brought  into  their  true  fold  of  rest  while  these  are  scat 
tered  on  the  hills,  as  sheep  having  no  shepherd.  And  do  not 
think  your  daughters  can  be  trained  to  the  truth  of  their 
own  human  beauty,  while  the  pleasant  places,  which  God 
made  at  once  for  their  school-room  and  their  play-ground, 
lie  desolate  and  denied.  You  cannot  baptize  them  rightly 
in  those  inch-deep  fonts  of  yours,  unless  you  baptize  them 
also  in  the  sweet  waters  which  the  great  Lawgiver  strikes 
forth  for  ever  from  the  rocks  of  your  native  land — waters 
which  a  Pagan  would  have  worshipped  in  their  purity,  and 
you  only  worship  with  pollution.  You  cannot  lead  your  chil 
dren  faithfully  to  those  narrow  axe-hewn  church  altars  of 
yours,  while  the  dark  azure  altars  in  heaven — the  mountains 
that  sustain  your  island  throne, — mountains  on  which  a 
Pagan  would  have  seen  the  powers  of  heaven  rest  in  every 
wreathed  cloud — remain  for  you  without  inscription  ;  altars 
built,  not  to,  but  by,  an  Unknown  God. 

III.  Thus  far,  then,  of  the  nature,  thus  far  of  the  teaching, 
of  woman,  and  thus  of  her  household  office,  and  queenliness. 
We  come  now  to  our  last,  our  widest  question, — What  is 
her  queenly  office  with  respect  to  the  state? 

Generally,  we  are  under  an  impression  that  a  man's  duties 
are  publb,  and  a  woman's  private.  But  this  Is  not  altogether 
so.  A  man  has  a  personal  work  or  duty,  relating  to  his  own 


OF  QUEENS'  GARDENS.  109 

home,  and  a  public  work  or  duty,  which  is  the  expansion  of 
the  other,  relating  to  the  state.  So  a  woman  has  a  personal 
work  or  duty,  relating  to  her  own  home,  and  a  public  work 
and  duty,  which  is  also  the  expansion  of  that. 

Now  the  man's  work  for  his  own  home  is,  as  has  been 
said,  to  secure  its  maintenance,  progress,  and  defence;  the 
woman's  to  secure  its  order,  comfort,  and  loveliness. 

Expand  both  these  functions.  The  man's  duty  as  a  mem 
ber  of  a  commonwealth,  is  to  assist  in  the  maintenance,  in 
the  advance,  in  the  defence  of  the  state.  The  woman's  duty, 
as  a  member  of  the  commonwealth,  is  to  assist  in  the  order 
ing,  in  the  comforting,  and  in  the  beautiful  adornment  of  the 
state. 

What  the  man  is  at  his  own  gate,  defending  it,  if  need  be, 
against  insult  and  spoil,  that  also,  not  in  a  less,  but  in  a  more 
devoted  measure,  he  is  to  be  at  the  gate  of  his  country, 
leaving  his  home,  if  need  be,  even  to  the  spoiler,  to  do  his 
more  incumbent  work  there. 

And,  in  like  manner,  what  the  woman  is  to  be  within  her. 
gates,  as  the  centre  of  order,  the  balm  of  distress,  and  the 
mirror  of  beauty ;  that  she  is  also  to  be  without  her  gates, 
where  order  is  more  difficult,  distress  more  imminent,  love 
liness  more  rare. 

And  as  within  the  human  heart  there  is  always  set  an 
instinct  for  all  its  real  duties, — an  instinct  which  you  cannot 


110  SESAME  AND   LILIES. 

quench,  but  only  warp  and  corrupt  if  you  withdraw  it  from 
its  true  purpose; — as  there  is  the  intense  instinct  of  love, 
which,  rightly  disciplined,  maintains  all  the  sanctities  of  life, 
and,  misdirected,  undermines  them;  and  must  do  either  the 
one  or  the  other ;  so  there  is  in  the  human  heart  an  inextin 
guishable  instinct,  the  love  of  power,  which,  rightly  directed, 
maintains  all  the  majesty  of  law  and  life,  and  misdirected, 
wrecks  them. 

Deep  rooted  in  the  innermost  life  of  the  heart  of  man,  and 
of  the  heart  of  woman,  God  set  it  there,  and  God  keeps 
it  there.  Vainly,  as  falsely,  you  blame  or  rebuke  the  desire 
of  power  ! — For  Heaven's  sake,  and  for  Man's  sake,  desire  it 
all  you  can.  But  what  power  ?  That  is  all  the  question. 
Power  to  destroy  ?  the  lion's  limb,  and  the  dragon's  breath  ? 
Not  so.  Power  to  heal,  to  redeem,  to  guide  and  to  guard. 
Power  of  the  sceptre  and  shield ;  the  power  of  the  royal 
hand  that  heals  in  touching, — that  binds  the  fiend  and  looses 
the  captive;  the  throne  that  is  founded  on  the  rock  of 
Justice,  and  descended  from  only  by  steps  of  mercy.  "Will 
you  not  covet  such  power  as  this,  and  seek  such  throne  as 
this,  and  be  no  more  housewives,  but  queens  ? 

It  is  now  long  since  the  women  of  England  arrogated, 
Universally,  a  title  which  once  belonged  to  nobility  only  ; 
and,  having  once  been  in  the  habit  of  accepting  the  simple 
title  of  gentlewoman,  as  correspondent  to  that  of  gentleman, 


OF  QUEENS'  GARDENS.  Ill 

insisted  on  the  privilege  of  assuming  the  title  of  "  Lady,"  * 
which  properly  corresponds  only  to  the  title  of  "  Lord." 

I  do  not  blame  them  for  this ;  but  only  for  their  narrow 
motive  in  this.  I  would  have  them  desire  and  claim  the 
title  of  Lady,  provided  they  claim,  not  merely  the  title,  but 
the  office  and  duty  signified  by  it.  Lady  means  "bread- 
giver  "  or  "  loaf-giver,"  and  Lord  means  "  maintainer  of 
laws,"  and  both  titles  have  reference,  not  to  the  law  which  is 
maintained  in  the  house,  nor  to  the  bread  which  is  given  to 
the  household;  but  to  law  maintained  for  the  multitude,  and 
to  bread  broken  among  the  multitude.  So  that  a  Lord  has 
legal  claim  only  to  his  title  in  so  far  as  he  is  the  maintainer 
of  the  justice  of  the  Lord  of  Lords;  and  a  Lady  has  legal 
claim  to  her  title,  only  so  far  as  she  communicates  that 
help  to  the  poor  representatives  of  her  Master,  which  women 
once,  ministering  to  Him  of  their  substance,  were  permitted 
to  extend  to  that  Master  Himself;  and  when  she  is  known, 
as  He  Himself  once  was,  in  breaking  of  bread. 

*  I  wish  there  were  a  true  order  of  chivalry  instituted  for  our  English 
youth  of  certain  ranks,  in  which  both  boy  and  girl  should  receive,  at  a 
given  age,  their  knighthood  and  ladyhood  by  true  title ;  attainable  only  by 
certain  probation  and  trial  both  of  character  and  accomplishment ;  and  to 
be  forfeited,  on  conviction,  by  their  peers,  of  any  dishonourable  act.  Such 
an  institution  would  be  entirely,  and  with  all  noble  results,  possible,  in  a 
nation  which  loved  honour.  That  it  would  not  be  possible  among  us, 
is  not  to  the  discredit  of  the  scheme. 


112  SESAME  AND   LILIES. 

And  this  beneficent  and  legal  dominion,  this  power  of  the 
Dominus,  or  House-Lord,  and  of  the  Domina,  or  House-Lady, 
is  great  and  venerable,  not  in  the  number  of  those  through 
whom  it  has  lineally  descended,  but  in  the  number  of  those 
whom  it  grasps  within  its  sway ;  it  is  always  regarded  with 
reverent  worship  wherever  its  dynasty  is  founded  on  its  duty, 
and  its  ambition  co-relative  with  its  beneficence.  Your  fancy 
is  pleased  with  the  thought  of  being  noble  ladies,  with  a 
train  of  vassals.  Be  it  so ;  you  cannot  be  too  noble,  and 
your  train  cannot  be  too  great;  but  see  to  it  that  your  train 
is  of  vassals  whom  you  serve  and  feed,  not  merely  of  slaves 
who  serve  and  feed  you  ;  and  that  the  multitude  which 
obeys  you  is  of  those  whom  you  have  comforted,  not  oppress 
ed, — whom  you  have  redeemed,  not  led  into  captivity. 

And  this,  which  is  true  of  the  lower  or  household  dominion, 
is  equally  true  of  the  queenly  dominion  ; — that  highest  dignity 
is  open  to  you,  if  you  will  also  accept  that  highest  duty. 
Rex  et  Regina — Roi  et  Reine — "  Right-doers  ; "  they  differ 
but  from  the  Lady  and  Lord,  in  that  their  power  is  supreme 
over  the  mind  as  over  the  person — that  they  not  only  feed 
and  clothe,  but  direct  and  teach.  And  whether  consciously 
or  not,  you  must  be,  in  many  a  heart,  enthroned  :  there  is  no 
putting  by  that  crown ;  queens  you  must  always  be  ;  queena 
to  your  lovers ;  queens  to  your  husbands  and  your  sons ; 
queens  of  higher  mystery  to  the  world  beyond,  which  bows 


OF  QUEENS'  GAKDENS.  113 

itself,  and  will  for  ever  bow,  before  the  myrtle  crown,  and 
the  stainless  sceptre,  of  womanhood.  But,  alas !  you  are  too 
often  idle  and  careless  queens,  grasping  at  majesty  in  tho 
least  things,  while  you  abdicate  it  in  the  greatest ;  and  leav 
ing  misrule  and  violence  to  work  their  will  among  men,  in 
defiance  of  the  power,  which,  holding  straight  in  gift  from 
the  Prince  of  all  Peace,  the  wicked  among  you  betray,  and 
the  good  forget. 

"  Prince  of  Peace."  Note  that  name.  When  kings  rule 
in  that  name,  and  nobles,  and  the  judges  of  the  earth,  they 
also,  in  their  narrow  place,  and  mortal  measure,  receive  the 
power  of  it.  There  are  no  other  rulers  than  they :  other  rule 
than  theirs  is  but  misrule ;  they  who  govern  verily  "  Dei 
gratis  "  are  all  princes,  yes,  or  princesses,  of  peace.  There- 
is  not  a  war  in  the  world,  no,  nor  an  injustice,  but  you  women 
are  answerable  for  it ;  not  in  that  you  have  provoked,  but  in 
that  you  have  not  hindered.  Men,  by  their  nature,  are  prone 
to  fight ;  they  will  fight  for  any  cause,  or  for  none.  It  is  for 
you  to  choose  their  cause  for  them,  and  to  forbid  them  when 
there  is  no  cause.  There  is  no  suffering,  no  injustice,  no 
misery  in  the  earth,  but  the  guilt  of  it  lies  lastly  with  you. 
Men  can  bear  the  sight  of  it,  but  you  should  not  be  able  to 
bear  it.  Men  may  tread  it  down  without  sympathy  in  their 
own  struggle;  but  men  are  feeble  in  sympathy,  and  con 
tracted  in  hope ;  it  is  you  only  who  can  feel  the  depths  of 


114  SESAME  AND  LILIES. 

pain ;  and  conceive  the  way  of  its  healing.  Instead  of  trying 
to  do  this,  you  turn  away  from  it ;  you  shut  yourselves  within 
your  park  walls  and  garden  gates;  and  you  are  content  to 
know  that  there  is  beyond  them  a  whole  world  in  wilderness 
— a  world  of  secrets  which  you  dare  not  penetrate  ;  and  of 
suffering  which  you  dare  not  conceive. 

I  tell  you  that  this  is  to  me  quite  the  most  amazing  among 
the  phenomena  of  humanity.  I  am  surprised  at  no  depths  to 
which,  when  once  warped  from  its  honour,  that  humanity  can 
be  degraded.  I  do  not  wonder  at  the  miser's  death,  with 
his  hands,  as  they  relax,  dropping  gold.  I  do  not  wonder  at 
the  sensualist's  life,  with  the  shroud  wrapped  about  his  feet. 
I  do  not  wonder  at  the  single-handed  murder  of  a  single 
victim,  done  by  the  assassin  in  the  darkness  of  the  railway, 
or  reed-shadow  of  the  marsh.  I  do  not  even  wonder  at  the 
myriad-handed  murder  of  multitudes,  done  boastfully  in  the 
daylight,  by  the  frenzy  of  nations,  and  the  immeasurable, 
unimaginable  guilt,  heaped  up  from  hell  to  heaven,  of  their 
priests,  and  kings.  But  this  is  wonderful  to  me — oh,  how 
wonderful! — to  see  the  tender  and  delicate  woman  among 
you,  with  her  child  at  her  breast,  and  a  power,  if  she  would 
wield  it,  over  it,  and  over  its  father,  purer  than  the  air  of 
heaven,  and  stronger  than  the  seas  of  earth — nay,  a  magni 
tude  of  blessing  which  her  husband  would  not  part  with  for 
all  that  earth  itself,  though  it  were  made  of  one  entire  and 


OF  QUEENS'  GAKDENS.  115 

perfect  chrysolite  : — to  see  her  abdicate  this  majesty  to  play 
at  precedence  with  her  next-door  neighbour !  This  is  won 
derful — oh,  wonderful ! — to  see  her,  with  every  innocent  feel 
ing  fresh  within  her,  go  out  in  the  morning  into  her  garden 
to  play  with  the  fringes  of  its  guarded  flowers,  and  lift  their 
heads  when  they  are  drooping,  with  her  happy  smile  upon 
her  face,  and  no  cloud  upon  her  brow,  because  there  is  a 
little  wall  around  her  place  of  peace :  and  yet  she  knows,  in 
her  heart,  if  she  would  only  look  for  its  knowledge,  that, 
outside  of  that  little  rose-covered  wall,  the  wild  grass,  to  the 
horizon,  is  torn  up  by  the  agony  of  men,  and  beat  level  by 
the  drift  of  their  life-blood. 

Have  you  ever  considered  what  a  deep  tinder  meaning 
there  lies,  or  at  least,  may  be  read,  if  we  choose,  in  our  cus 
tom  of  strewing  flowers  before  those  whom  we  think  most 
happy  ?  Do  you  suppose  it  is  merely  to  deceive  them  into 
the  hope  that  happiness  is  always  to  fall  thus  in  showers  at 
their  feet  ? — that  wherever  they  pass  they  will  tread  on  herbs 
of  swreet  scent,  and  that  the  rough  ground  will  be  made 
smooth  for  them  by  depth  of  roses  ?  So  surely  as  they 
believe  that,  they  will  have,  instead,  to  walk  on  bitter  herbs 
and  thorns ;  and  the  only  softness  to  their  feet  will  be  of 
snow.  But  it  is  not  thus  intended  they  should  believe* 
there  is  a  better  meaning  in  that  old  custom.  The  path  of  a 
good  woman  is  indeed  strewn  with  flowers;  but  they  rise 


116  SESAME  AND   LILIES. 

behind  her  steps,  not  before  them.  "  Her  feet  ha\e  touched 
the  meadows,  and  left  the  daisies  rosy."  You  think  that 
only  a  lover's  fancy ; — false  and  vain !  How  if  it  could  be 
true  ?  You  think  this  also,  perhaps,  only  a  poet's  fancy — 

"  Even  the  light  harebell  raised  its  head 
Elastic  from  her  airy  tread." 

But  it  is  little  to  say  of  a  woman,  that  she  only  does  not 
destroy  where  she  passes.  She  should  revive  ;  the  harebells 
should  bloom,  not  stoop,  as  she  passes.  You  think  I  am 
going  into  wild  hyperbole?  Pardon  me,  not  a  whit — I 
mean  what  I  say  in  calm  English,  spoken  in  resolute  truth. 
You  have  heard  it  said — (and  I  believe  there  is  more  than 
fancy  even  in  that  saying,  but  let  it  pass  for  a  fanciful  one) — 
that  flowers  only  flourish  rightly  in  the  garden  of  some  one 
who  loves  them.  I  know  you  would  like  that  to  be  true ; 
you  would  think  it  a  pleasant  magic  if  you  could  flush  your 
flowers  into  brighter  bloom  by  a  kind  look  upon  them :  nay, 
more,  if  your  look  had  the  power,  not  only  to  cheer,  but  to 
guard  them — if  you  could  bid  the  black  blight  turn  away, 
and  the  knotted  caterpillar  spare — if  you  could  bid  the  dew 
fall  upon  them  in  the  drought,  and  say  to  the  south  wind,  in 
frost — "  Come,  thou  south,  and  breathe  upon  my  garden,  that 
the  spices  of  it  may  flow  out."  This  you  would  think  a 
great  thing  ?  And  do  you  think  it  not  a  greater  thing,  that 


or  QUEENS'  GARDENS.  117 

all  this,  (and  how  much  more  than  this!)  you  can  do,  for 
fairer  flowers  than  these — flowers  that  could  bless  you  for 
having  blessed  them,  and  will  love  you  for  having  loved 
them  ; — flowers  that  have  eyes  like  yours,  and  thoughts  like 
yours,  and  lives  like  yours  ;  which,  once  saved,  you  save  for 
ever  ?  Is  this  only  a  little  power  ?  Far  among  the  moor 
lands  and  the  rocks, — far  in  the  darkness  of  the  terrible 
streets, — these  feeble  florets  are  lying,  with  all  their  fresh 
leaves  torn,  and  their  stems  broken — will  you  never  go  down 
to  them,  nor  set  them  in  order  in  their  little  fragrant  beds, 
nor  fence  them  in  their  shuddering  from  the  fierce  wind? 
Shall  morning  follow  morning,  for  you,  but  not  for  them ; 
and  the  dawn  rise  to  watch,  far  away,  those  frantic  Dances 
of  Death  ;*  but  no  dawn  rise  to  breathe  upon  these  living 
banks  of  wild  violet,  and  woodbine,  and  rose ;  nor  call  to 
you,  through  your  casement, — call,  (not  giving  you  the  name 
of  the  English  poet's  lady,  but  the  name  of  Dante's  great 
Matilda,  who,  on  the  edge  of  happy  Lethe,  stood,  wreathing 
flowers  with  flowers,)  saying : — 

"  Come  into  the  garden,  Maud, 
For  the  black  bat,  night,  has  flown, 
And  the  woodbine  spices  are  wafted  abroad 
And  the  musk  of  the  roses  blown  ?" 

Will  you  not  go  down  among  them  ? — among  those  sweet 
*  See  note,  p.  57. 


118  SESAME  AND  LILIES. 

living  things,  whose  new  courage,  sprung  from  the  earth 
with  the  deep  colour  of  heaven  upon  it,  is  starting  up  in 
strength  of  goodly  spire ;  and  whose  purity,  washed  from 
the  dust,  is  opening,  bud  by  bud,  into  the  flower  of  promise ; 
— and  still  they  turn  to  you,  and  for  you,  "  The  Larkspur 
listens — I  hear,  I  hear !  And  the  Lily  whispers — I  wait." 

Did  you  notice  that  I  missed  two  lines  when  I  read  you 
that  first  stanza;  and  think  that  I  had  forgotten  them? 
Hear  them  now : — 

"  Come  into  the  garden,  Maud, 
For  the  black  bat,  night,  has  flown ; 
Come  into  the  garden,  Maud, 
I  am  here  at  the  gate,  alone." 

Who  is  it,  think  you,  who  stands  at  the  gate  of  this 
sweeter  garden,  alone,  waiting  for  you  ?  Did  you  ever  hear, 
not  of  a  Maude,  but  a  Madeleine,  who  went  down  to  her 
garden  in  the  dawn,  and  found  One  waiting  at  the  gate, 
whom  she  supposed  to  be  the  gardener?  Have  you  not 
sought  Him  often; — sought  Him  in  vain,  all  through  the 
night ; — sought  Him  in  vain  at  the  gate  of  that  old  garden 
where  the  fiery  sword  is  set?  He  is  never  there ;  but  at  the 
gate  of  this  garden  He  is  waiting  always — waiting  to  take 
your  hand — ready  to  go  down  to  see  the  fruits  of  the  valley, 


OF  QUEENS'  GARDENS.  119 

to  see  whether  the  vine  has  flourished,  and  the  pomegranate 
budded.  There  you  shall  see  with  Him  the  little  tendrils  of 
the  vines  that  His  hand  is  guiding — there  you  shall  see  the 
pomegranate  springing  where  His  hand  cast  the  sanguine 
seed  ; — more  :  you  shall  see  the  troops  of  the  angel  keepers 
that,  with  their  wings,  wave  away  the  hungry  birds  from  the 
pathsides  where  He  has  sown,  and  call  to  each  other  between 
the  vineyard  rows,  u  Take  us  the  foxes,  the  little  foxes,  that 
spoil  the  vines,  for  our  vines  have  tender  grapes."  Oh — you 
queens — you  queens  !  among  the  hills  and  happy  greenwood 
of  this  land  of  yours,  shall  the  foxes  have  holes,  and  the 
birds  of  the  air  have  nests ;  and,  in  your  cities,  shall  the 
stones  cry  out  against  you,  that  they  are  the  only  pillows 
where  the  Son  of  Man  can  lay  His  head  ? 


THE   SND. 


INQUIRY 


THE  CONDITIONS  AT  PRESENT  AFFECTING 


THE    STUDY  OF  ARCHITECTURE' 


IN  OUR  SCHOOLS. 


BY   JOHN   RUSKIISr. 


Read  at  the  Ordinary  General  Meeting  of  th*  lioyal  Institute  of  British  Architects, 
May  15th,  1865. 


NEW  YORK: 
JOHN  WILEY"  &  SON,   535   BROADWAY. 

1866. 


THE  STUDY  OF  ARCHITECTURE. 


I  SUPPOSE  there  is  -no  man  who,  permitted  to  address,  for  the 
first  time,  the  Institute  of  British  Architects,  would  not  feel 
himself  abashed  and  restrained,  doubtful  of  his  claim  to  be 
heard  by  them,  even  if  he  attempted  only  to  describe  what 
had  come  under  his  personal  observation,  much  more  if  on 
the  occasion  he  thought  it  would  be  expected  of  him  to 
touch  upon  any  of  the  general  principles  of  the  art  of  archi 
tecture  before  its  principal  English  masters.  * 

But  if  any  more  than  another  should  feel  thus  abashed,  it 
is  certainly  one  who  has  first  to  ask  their  pardon  for  the  petu 
lance  of  boyish  expressions  of  partial  thought ;  for  ungrace 
ful  advocacy  of  principles  which  needed  no  support  from 
him,  and  discourteous  blame  of  work  of  which  he  had  never 
fell  the  difficulty. 

Yet,  when  I  ask  this  pardon,  gentlemen — and  I  do  it  sin 
cerely  and  in  shame — it  is  not  as  desiring  to  retract  anything 
in  the  general  tenor  and  scope  of  what  I  have  hitherto  tried 


4  THE   STUDY   OF  AKCHITECTUKE. 

to  say.  Permit  me  the  pain,  and  the  apparent  impertinence, 
of  speaking  for  a  moment  of  my  own  past  work ;  for  it  is 
necessary  that  what  I  am  about  to  submit  to  you  to-night 
should  be  spoken  in  no  disadvantageous  connexion  with  that ; 
and  yet  understood  as  spoken  in  no  discordance  of  purpose 
with  that.  Indeed,  there  is  much  in  old  work  of  mine  which 
I  could  wish  to  put  out  of  mind.  Reasonings,  perhaps  not 
in  themselves  false,  but  founded  on  insufficient  data  and 
imperfect  experience — eager  preferences,  and  dislikes,  depen 
dent  on  chance  circumstances  of  association,  and  limitations 
of  sphere  of  labour  :  but,  while  I  would  fain  now,  if  I  could, 
modify  the  applications,  and  chasten  the  extravagance  of  my 
writings,  let  me  also  say  of  them  that  they  were  the  expres 
sion  of  a  delight  in  the  art  of  architecture  which  was  too 
intense  to  be  vitally  deceived,  and  of  an  inquiry  too  honest 
and  eager  to  be 'without  some  useful  result ;  and  I  only  wish 
I  had  now  time,  and  strength,  and  power  of  mind,  to  carry 
on,  more  worthily,  the  main  endeavour  of  my  early  work. 
That  main  endeavour  has  been  throughout  to  set  forth  the  life 
of  the  individual  human  spirit  as  modifying  the  application 
of  the  formal  laws  of  architecture,  no  less  than  of  all  other 
arts ;  and  to  show  that  the  power  and  advance  of  this  art, 
even  in  conditions  of  formal  nobleness,  were  dependent  on  its 
just  association  with  sculpture  as  a  means  of  expressing  the 
beauty  of  natural  forms :  and  I  the  more  boldly  ask  your 


THE  STUDY  OF  ARCHITECTUKE.  5 

permission  to  insist  somewhat  on  this  main  meaning  of  my 
past  work,  because  there  are  many  buildings  now  rising  in 
the  streets  of  London,  as  in  other  cities  of  England,  which 
appear  to  be  designed  in  accordance  with  this  principle,  and 
which  are,  I  believe,  more  offensive  to  all  who  thoughtfully 
concur  with  me  in  accepting  the  principle  of  Naturalism  than 
they  are  to  the  classical  architect  to  whose  modes  of  design 
they  are  visibly  antagonistic.  These  buildings,  in  which  the 
mere  cast  of  a  flower,  or  the  realization  of  a  vulgar  face, 
carved  without  pleasure  by  a  workman  who  is  only  endea 
vouring  to  attract  attention  by  novelty,  and  then  fastened  on, 
or  appearing  to  be  fastened,  as  chance  may  dictate,  to  an 
arch,  or  a  pillar,  or  a  wall,  hold  such  relation  to  nobly  natu 
ralistic  architecture  as  common  sign-painter's  furniture  land 
scapes  do  to  painting,  or  commonest  wax-work  to  Greek 
sculpture;  and  the  feelings  with  which  true  naturalists  regard 
such  buildings  of  this  class  are,  as  nearly  as  might  be,  what 
a  painter  would  experience,  if,  having  contended  earnestly 
against  conventional  schools,  and  having  asserted  that  the 
Greek  vase-painting,  and  Egyptian  wall-painting,  and  Mediae 
val  glass-painting,  though  beautiful,  all,  in  their  place  and 
way,  were  yet  subordinate  arts,  and  culminated  only  in  per 
fectly  naturalistic  work  such  as  Raphael's  in  fresco,  and 
Titian's  on  canvas ; — if,  I  say,  a  painter,  fixed  in  such  faith 
in  an  entire,  intellectual,  and  manly  truth,  and  maintaining* 


6  THE  STUDY  OF  ARCHITECTURE. 

that  an  Egyptian  profile  of  a  head,  however  decoratively 
applicable,  was  only  noble  for  such  human  truth  as  it  con 
tained,  and  was  imperfect  and  ignoble  beside  a  work  of 
Titian's,  were  shown,  by  his  antagonist,  the  colored  daguer 
reotype  of  a  human  body  in  its  nakedness,  and  told  that  it 
was  art  such  as  that  which  he  really  advocated,  and  to  such 
art  that  his  principles,  if  carried  out,  would  finally  lead. 

And  because  this  question  lies  at  the  very  root  of  the 
organization  of  the  system  of  instruction  for  our  youth,  I 
venture  boldly  to  express  the  surprise  and  regret  with  which 
I  see  our  schools  still  agitated  by  assertions  of  the  opposi 
tion  of  Naturalism  to  Invention,  and  to  the  higher  conditions 
of  art.  Even  in  this  very  room  I  believe  there  has  lately 
been  question  whether  a  sculptor  should  look  at  a  real  living 
creature  of  which  he  had  to  carve  the  image.  I  would 
answer  in  one  sense, — no  ;  that  is  to  say,  he  ought  to  carve  no 
living  creature  while  he  still  needs  to  look  at  it.  If  we  do 
not  know  what  a  human  body  is  like,  we  certainly  had  better 
look,  and  look  often,  at  it,  before  we  carve  it ;  but  if  we 
already  know  the  human  likeness  so  well  that  we  can  carve  it 
by  light  of  memory,  we  shall  not  need  to  ask  whether  we 
ought  now  to  look  at  it  or  not ;  and  what  is  true  of  man  is 
true  of  all  other  creatures  and  organisms — of  bird,  and 
beast,  and  leaf.  No  assertion  is  more  at  variance  with  the 
'laws  of  classical  as  well  as  of  subsequent  art  than  the  com 


THE  STUDY  OF  ARCHITECTURE.  ? 

mon  one  that  species  should  not  be  distinguished  in  great 
design.  We  might  as  well  say  that  we  ought  to  carve  a  man 
so  as  not  to  know  him  from  an  ape,  as  that  we  should  carve 
a  lily  so  as  not  to  know  it  from  a  thistle.  It  is  difficult  for 
me  to  conceive  how  this  can  be  asserted  in  the  presence  of 
any  remains  either  of  great  Greek  or  Italian  art.  A  Greek 
looked  at  a  cockle-shell  or  a  cuttle-fish  as  carefully  as  he 
Booked  at  an  Olympic  conqueror.  The  eagle  of  Elis,  the 
lion  of  Velia,  the  horse  of  Syracuse,  the  bull  of  Thurii,  the 
dolphin  of  Tarentum,  the  crab  of  Agrigentum,  and  the  craw 
fish  of  Catana,  are  studied  as  closely,  every  one  of  them,  as 
the  Juno  of  Argos,  or  Apollo  of  Clazomenae.  Idealism,  so 
far  from  being  contrary  to  special  truth,  is  the  very  abstrac 
tion  of  specialty  from  everything  else.  It  is  the  earnest 
statement  of  the  characters  which  make  man  man,  and  cockle 
cockle,  and  flesh  flesh,  and  fish  fish.  Feeble  thinkers 
indeed,  always  suppose  that  distinction  of  kind  involves 
meanness  of  style  ;  but  the  meanness  is  in  the  treatment,  not 
in  the  distinction.  There  is  a  noble  way  of  carving  a  man, 
and  a  mean  one ;  and  there  is  a  noble  way  of  carving  a 
beetle,  and  a  mean  one ;  and  a  great  sculptor  carves  his  scara 
baeus  grandly,  as  he  carves  his  king,  while  a  mean  sculptor 
makes  vermin  of  both.  And  it  is  a  sorrowful  truth,  yet  a 
sublime  one,  that  this  greatness  of  treatment  cannot  be 
taught  by  talking  about  it.  No,  nor  even  by  enforced  irai- 


8  THE  STUDY  OF  ARCHITECTUKE. 

tative  practice  of  it.  Men  treat  their  subjects  nobly  only 
when  \\iey  themselves  become  noble ;  not  till  then.  And 
that  elevation  of  their  own  nature  is  assuredly  not  to  be 
effected  by  a  course  of  drawing  from  models,  however  well 
chosen,  or  of  listening  to  lectures,  however  well  intended 

Art,  national  or  individual,  is  the  result  of  a  long  course 
of  previous  life  and  training ;  a  necessary  result,  if  that  life 
has  been  loyal,  and  an  impossible  one,  if  it  has  been  base. 
Let  a  nation  be  healthful,  happy,  pure  in  its  enjoyments, 
brave  in  its  acts,  and  broad  in  its  affections,  and  its  art  will 
spring  round  and  within  it  as  freely  as  the  foam  from  a  foun 
tain  ;  but  let  the  springs  of  its  life  be  impure,  and  its  course 
polluted,  and  you  will  not  get  the  bright  spray  by  treatises 
on  the  mathematical  structure  of  bubbles. 

And  I  am  to-night  the  more  restrained  in  addressing  you, 
because,  gentlemen — I  tell  you  honestly — I  am  weary  of  all 
writing  and  speaking  about  art,  and  most  of  my  own.  No 
good  is  to  be  reached  that  way.  The  last  fifty  years  have,  in 
every  civilized  country  of  Europe,  produced  more  brilliant 
thought,  and  more  subtle  reasoning  about  art,  than  the  five 
thousand  before  them ;  and  what  has  it  all  come  to  ?  Do  not 
let  it  be  thought  that  I  am  insensible  to  the  high  merits  of 
much  of  our  modern  work.  It  cannot  be  for  a  moment  sup 
posed  that  in  speaking  of  the  inefficient  expression  of  the 
doctrines  which  writers  on  art  have  tried  to  enforce,  I  was 


THE  STUDY  OF  ARCHITECTURE.  9 

thinking  of  such  Gothic  as  has  been  designed  and  built  by 
Mr.  Scott,  Mr.  Butterfield,  Mr.  Street,  Mr.  Waterhouse,  Mr. 
Godwin,  or  my  dead  friend,  Mr.  Woodward.  Their  work 
has  been  original  and  independent.  So  far  as  it  is  good,  it 
has  been  founded  on  principles  learned  not  from  books,  but 
by  study  of  the  monuments  of  the  great  schools,  developed 
by  national  grandeur,  not  by  philosophical  speculation.  But 
I  am  entirely  assured  that  those  who  have  done  best  among 
us  are  the  least  satisfied  with  what  they  have  done,  and  will 
admit  a  sorrowful  concurrence  in  my  belief  that  the  spirit,  or 
rather,  I  should  say,  the  dispirit,  of  the  age,  is  heavily 
against  them ;  that  all  the  ingenious  writing  or  thinking 
which  is  so  rife  amongst  us  has  failed  to  educate  a  public 
capable  of  taking  true  pleasure  in  any  kind  of  art,  and  that 
the  best  designers  never  satisfy  their  own  requirements  of 
themselves,  unless  by  vainly  addressing  another  temper  of 
mind,  and  providing  for  another  manner  of  life,  than  ours. 
All  lovely  architecture  was  designed  for  cities  in  cloudless 
air ;  for  cities  in  which  piazzas  and  gardens  opened  in  bright 
populousness  and  peace;  cities  built  that  men  might  live 
happily  in  them,  and  take  delight  daily  in  each  other's  pre 
sence  and  powers,  But  our  cities,  built  in  black  air,  which, 
by  its  accumulated  foulness,  first  renders  all  ornament  invisi 
ble  in  distance,  and  then  chokes  its  interstices  with  soot ; 

cities  which   are  mere  crowded  masses  of  store,  and  ware- 

1* 


10  THE  STUDF  OF   ARCHITECTURE. 

house,  and  counter,  and  are  therefore  to  the  rest  of  the 
world  what  the  larder  and  cellar  are  to  a  private  house  ; 
cities  in  which  the  object  of  men  is  not  life,  but  labour;  and 
in  which  all  chief  magnitude  of  edifice  is  to  enclose  machi 
nery  ;  cities  in  which  the  streets  are  not  the  avenues  for  the 
passing  and  procession  of  a  happy  people,  but  the  drains  for 
the  discharge  of  a  tormented  mob,  in  which  the  only  object 
In  reaching  any  spot  is  to  be  transferred  to  another ;  in  which 
existence  becomes  mere  transition,  and  every  creature  is  only 
one  atom  in  a  drift  of  human  dust,  and  current  of  inter 
changing  particles,  circulating  here  by  tunnels  under  ground, 
and  there  by  tubes  in  the  air;  for  a  city,  or  cities,  such  as 
this,  no  architecture  is  possible — nay,  no  desire  of  it  is  possi 
ble  to  their  inhabitants. 

One  of  the  most  singular  proofs  of  the  vanity  of  all  hope 
that  conditions  of  art  may  be  combined  with  the  occupations 
of  such  a  city,  has  been  given  lately  in  the  design  of  the  new 
iron  bridge  over  the  Thames  at  Blackfriars.  Distinct 
attempt  has  been  there  made  to  obtain  architectural  effect  on 
a  grand  scale.  Nor  was  there  anything  in  the  nature  of  the 
work  to  prevent  such  an  effort  being  successful.  It  is  not  an 
edifice's  being  of  iron,  or  of  glass,  or  thrown  into  new  forms, 
demanded  by  new  purposes,  which  need  hinder  its  being 
beautiful.  But  it  is  the  absence  of  all  desire  of  beauty,  of 
all  joy  in  fancy,  and  of  all  freedom  in  thought.  If  a  Greek, 


THE  STUDY  OF  ARCHITECTURE.  11 

or  Egyptian,  or  Gothic  architect  had  been  required  to  design 
such  a  bridge,  he  would  have  looked  instantly  at  the  main 
conditions  of  its  structure,  and  dwelt  on  them  with  the 
delight  of  imagination.  He  would  have  seen  that  the  main 
thing  to  be  done  was  to  hold  a  horizontal  group  of  iron  rods 
steadily  and  straight  over  stone  piers.  Then  he  would  have 
said  to  himself  (or  felt  without  saying),  "  It  is  this  holding, 
— this  grasp, — this  securing  tenor  of  a  thing  which  might  be 
shaken,  so  that  it  cannot  be  shaken,  on  which  I  have  to 
insist."  And  he  would  have  put  some  life  into  those  iron 
tenons.  As  a  Greek  put  human  life  into  his  pillars  and  pro 
duced  the  caryatid ;  and  an  Egyptian  lotus  life  into  his 
pillars,  and  produced  the  lily  capital :  so  here,  either  of  them 
would  have  put  some  gigantic  or  some  angelic  life  into  those 
colossal  sockets.  He  would  perhaps  have  put  vast  winged 
statues  of  bronze,  folding  their  wings,  and  grasping  the  iron 
rails  with  their  hands ;  or  monstrous  eagles,  or  serpents 
holding  with  claw  or  coil,  or  strong  four-footed  animals 
couchant,  holding  with  the  paw,  or  in  fierce  action,  holding 
with  teeth.  Thousands  of  grotesque  or  of  lovely  thoughts 
would  have  risen  before  him,  and  the  bronze  forms,  animal  or 
human,  would  have  signified,  either  in  symbol  or  in  legend, 
whatever  might.be  gracefully  told  respecting  the  purposes  of 
the  work  and  the  districts  to  which  it  conducted.  Whereas, 
now,  the  entire  invention  of  the  designer  seems  to  have 


12  THE  STUDY  OF  ARCHITECTURE. 

exhausted  itself  in  exaggerating  to  an  enormous  size  a  weak 
form  of  iron  nut,  and  in  conveying  the  information  upon  it, 
in  large  letters,  that  it  belongs  to  the  London,  Chatham,  and 
Dover  Railway  Company.  I  believe  then,  gentlemen,  that  if 
there  were  any  life  in  the  national  mind  in  such  respects,  it 
would  be  shown  in  these  its  most  energetic  and  costly  works. 
But  that  there  is  no  such  life,  nothing  but  a  galvanic  restless 
ness  and  covetousness,  with  which  it  is  for  the  present  vain 
to  strive ;  and  in  the  midst  of  which,  tormented  at  once  by 
its  activities  and  its  apathies,  having  their  work  continually 
thrust  aside  and  dishonoured,  always  seen  to  disadvantage, 
and  overtopped  by  huge  masses,  discordant  and  destructive, 
even  the  best  architects  must  be  unable  to  do  justice  to  their 
own  powers. 

But,  gentlemen,  while  thus  the  mechanisms  of  the  age  pre 
vent  even  the  wisest  and  best  of  its  artists  from  producing 
entirely  good  work,  may  we  not  reflect  with  consternation 
what  a  marvellous  ability  the  luxury  of  the  age,  and  the  very 
advantages  of  education,  confer  on  the  unwise  and  ignoble 
for  the  production  of  attractively  and  infectiously  bad  work. 
I  do  not  think  that  this  adverse  influence,  necessarily  affect 
ing  all  conditions  of  so-called  civilization,  has  been  ever 
enough  considered.  It  is  impossible  to  calculate  the  power 
of  the  false  workman  in  an  advanced  period  of  national  life, 
nor  the  temptation  to  all  workmen  to  become  false. 


THE  STUDY  OF  ARCHITECTURE.  13 

First,  there  is  the  irresistible  appeal  to  vanity.  There  is 
hardly  any  temptation  of  the  kind  (there  cannot  be)  while 
the  arts  are  in  progress.  The  best  men  must  then  always  be 
ashamed  of  themselves ;  they  never  can  be  satisfied  with 
their  work  absolutely,  but  only  as  it  is  progressive.  Take, 
for  instance,  any  archaic  head  intended  to  be  beautiful ;  say, 
the  Attic  Athena,  on  the  early  Arethusa  of  Syracuse.  In 
that,  and  in  all  archaic  work  of  promise,  there  is  much  that 
is  inefficient,  much  that  to  us  appears  ridiculous — but  nothing 
sensual,  nothing  vain,  nothing  spurious  or  imitative.  It  is  a 
child's  work,  a  childish  nation's  work,  but  not  a  fool's  work. 
You  find  in  children  the  same  tolerance  of  ugliness,  the  same 
eager  and  innocent  delight  in  their  own  work  for  the 
moment,  however  feeble ;  but  next  day  it  is  thrown  aside, 
and  something  better  is  done.  Now,  in  this  careless  play,  a 
child  or  a  childish  nation  differs  inherently  from  a  foolish 
educated  person,  or  a  nation  advanced  in  pseudo-civilization. 
The  educated  person  has  seen  all  kinds  of  beautiful  things, 
of  which  he  would  fain  do  the  like — not  to  add  to  their  num 
ber — but  for  his  own  vanity,  that  he  also  may  be  called  an 
artist.  Here  is  at  once  a  singular  and  fatal  difference.  The 
childish  nation  sees  nothing  in  its  own  past  work  to  satisfy 
itself.  It  is  pleased  at  having  done  this,  but  wants  something 
better ;  it  is  struggling  forward  always  to  reach  this  better, 
this  ideal  conception.  It  wants  more  beauty  to  look  at,  it 


14  THE   STUDY  OF  ARCHITECTURE. 

wants  more  subject  to  feel.  It  calls  out  to  all  its  artists- 
stretching  its  hands  to  them  as  a  little  child  does — "  Oh,  if 
you  would  but  tell  me  another  story," — "  Oh,  if  I  might  but 
have  a  doll  with  bluer  eyes."  That's  the  right  temper  to 
work  in,  and  to  get  work  done  for  you  in.  But  the  vain, 
aged,  highly-educated  nation  is  satiated  with  beautiful  things 
— it  has  myriads  more  than  it  can  look  at ;  it  has  fallen  into 
a  habit  of  inattention ;  it  passes  weary  and  jaded  through 
galleries  which  contain  the  best  fruit  of  a  thousand  years  of 
human  travail ;  it  gapes  and  shrugs  over  them,  and  pushes  its 
way  past  them  to  the  door.  But  there  is  one  feeling  that  is 
always  distinct;  however  jaded  and  languid  we  may  be  in  all 
other  pleasures,  we  are  never  languid  in  vanity,  and  we  would 
still  paint  and  carve  for  fame.  What  other  motive  have  the 
nations  of  Europe  to-day  ?  If  they  wanted  art  for  art's  sake, 
they  would  take  care  of  what  they  have  already  got.  But  at 
this  instant  the  two  noblest  pictures  in  Venice  are  lying 
rolled  up  in  out-houses,  and  the  noblest  portrait  of  Titian  hi 
existence  is  hung  forty  feet  from  the  ground.  We  have 
absolutely  no  motive  but  vanity  and  the  love  of  money — no 
others,  as  nations,  than  these,  whatever  we  may  have  as  indi 
viduals.  And  as  the  thirst  of  vanity  thus  increases,  so  the 
temptation  to  it.  There  was  no  fame  of  artists  in  these 
archaic  days.  Every  year,  every  hour,  saw  some  one  rise  to 
surpass  what  had  been  done  before.  And  there  was  always 


THE   STUDY   OF   ARCHITECTURE.  15 

better  work  to  be  done,  but  never  any  credit  to  be  got  by  it. 
The  artist  lived  in  an  atmosphere  of  perpetual,  wholesome, 
inevitable  eclipse.  Do  as  well  as  you  choose  to-day, — make 
the  whole  Borgo  dance  with  delight,  they  would  dance  to  a 
better  man's  pipe  to-morrow.  Credette  Cimdbue  nella  pit- 
titra,  tener  lo  campo,  et  or  a  ha  Giotto  il  grido.  This  was  the 
fate,  the  necessary  fate,  even  of  the  strongest.  They  could 
only  hope  to  be  remembered  as  links  in  an  endless  chain. 
For  the  weaker  men  it  was  no  use  even  to  put  their  name  on 
their  works.  They  did  not.  If  they  could  not  work  for  joy 
and  for  love,  and  take  their  part  simply  in  the  choir  of  human 
toil,  they  might  throw  up  their  tools.  But  now  it  is  far 
otherwise — now,  the  best  having  been  done — and  for  a  couple 
of  hundred  years,  the  best  of  us  being  confessed  to  have 
come  short  of  it,  everybody  thinks  that  he  may  be  the  great 
man  once  again ;  and  this  is  certain,  that  whatever  in  art  is 
done  for  display,  is  invariably  wrong. 

But,  secondly,  consider  the  attractive  power  of  false  art, 
completed,  as  compared  with  imperfect  art  advancing  to 
completion.  Archaic  work,  so  far  as  faultful,  is  repulsive ; 
but  advanced  work  is,  in  all  its  faults,  attractive.  The 
moment  that  art  has  reached  the  point  at  which  it  becomes 
sensitively  and  delicately  imitative,  it  appeals  to  a  new 
audience.  From  that  instant  it  addresses  the  sensualist  and 
the  idler.  Its  deceptions,  its  successes,  its  subtleties,  become 


16  THE  STUDY   OF  ARCHITECTURE. 

interesting  to  every  condition  of  folly,  of  frivolity,  and  of 
vice.  And  this  new  audience  brings  to  bear  upon  the  art  in 
which  its  foolish  and  wicked  interest  has  been  unhappily 
awakened,  the  full  power  of  its  riches  :  the  largest  bribes  of 
gold  as  well  as  of  praise  are  offered  to  the  artist  who  will 
betray  his  art,  until  at  last,  from  the  sculpture  of  Phidias  and 
fresco  of  Luini,  it  sinks  into  the  cabinet  ivory  and  the  picture 
kept  under  lock  and  key.  Between  these  highest  and  lowest 
types,  there  is  a  vast  mass  of  merely  imitative  and  delicately 
sensual  sculpture  ;  veiled  nymphs — chained  slaves — soft  god 
desses  seen  by  rose-light  through  suspended  curtains — draw 
ing-room  portraits  and  domesticities,  and  such  like,  in  which 
the  interest  is  either  merely  personal  and  selfish,  or  dramatic 
and  sensational;  in  either  case,  destructive  of  the  power  of 
the  public  to  sympathize  with  the  aims  of  great  architects. 

Gentlemen,  I  am  no  Puritan,  and  have  never  praised  or 
advocated  Puritanical  art.  The  two  pictures  which  I  would 
last  part  with  out  of  our  National  Gallery,  if  there  were 
question  of  parting  with  any,  would  be  Titian's  Bacchus  and 
Correggio's  Venus.  But  the  noble  naturalism  of  these  was 
the  fruit  of  ages  of  previous  courage,  continence,  and  reli 
gion — it  was  the  fulness  of  passion  in  the  life  of  a  Britomart. 
But  the  mid  age  and  old  age  of  nations  is  not  like  the  mid  age 
or  old  age  of  noble  women.  National  decrepitude  must  be 
criminal.  National  death  can  only  be  by  disease,  and  yet  it 


THE   STUDY   QF   ARCHITECTURE.  17 

is  almost  impossible,  out  of  the  history  of  the  art  of  nations, 
to  elicit  the  true  conditions  relating  to  its  decline  in  any 
demonstrable  manner.  The  history  of  Italian  art  is  that  of  a 
struggle  between  superstition  and  naturalism  on  one  side, 
between  continence  and  sensuality  on  another.  So  far  as 
naturalism  prevailed  over  superstition,  there  is  always  pro 
gress;  so  far  as  sensuality  over  chastity,  death.  And  the 
two  contests  are  simultaneous.  It  is  impossible  to  distin 
guish  one  victory  from  the  other.  Observe,  however,  I  say 
victory  over  superstition,  not  over  religion.  Let  me  carefully 
define  the  difference.  Superstition,  in  all  times  and  among 
all  nations,  is  the  fear  of  a  spirit  whose  passions  are  those  of 
a  man,  whose  acts  are  the  acts  of  a  man ;  who  is  present  in 
some  places,  not  in  others;  who  makes  some  places  holy,  and 
not  others ;  who  is  kind  to  one  person,  unkind  to  another ; 
who  is  pleased  or  angry  according  to  the  degree  of  attention 
you  pay  to  him,  or  praise  you  refuse  to  him ;  who  is  hostile 
generally  to  human  pleasure,  but  may  be  bribed  by  sacrifice 
of  a  part  of  that  pleasure  into  permitting  the  rest.  This, 
whatever  form  of  faith  it  colours,  is  the  essence  of  superstition. 
And  religion  is  the  belief  in  a  Spirit  whose  mercies  are  over 
all  His  works — who  is  kind  even  to  the  unthankful  and  the 
evil ;  who  is  everywhere  present,  and  therefore  is  in  no  place 
to  be  sought,  and  in  no  place  to  be  evaded ;  to  whom  all 
creatures,  times,  and  things  are  everlastingly  holy,  and  whc 


18  THE  STUDY  OF  AflCHITECTUKE. 

claims — not  tithes  of  wealth,  nor  sevenths  of  days — but  all 
the  wealth  that  we  have,  and  all  the  days  that  we  live,  and 
all  the  beings  that  we  are,  but  who  claims  that  totality 
because  He  delights  only  in  the  delight  of  His  creatures  ;  and 
because,  therefore,  the  one  duty  that  they  owe  to  Him,  and 
the  only  service  they  can  render  Him,  is  to  be  happy.  A 
Spirit,  therefore,  whose  eternal  benevolence  cannot  be 
angered,  cannot  be  appeased;  whose  laws  are  everlasting 
and  inexorable,,  so  that  heaven  and  earth  must  indeed  pass 
away  if  one  jot  of  them  failed :  laws  which  attach  to  every 
wrong  and  error  a  measured,  inevitable  penalty;  to  every 
rightness  and  prudence,  an  assured  reward ;  penalty,  of  which 
the  remittance  cannot  be  purchased ;  and  reward,  of  which 
the  promise  cannot  be  broken. 

And  thus,  in  the  history  of  art,  we  ought  continually  to 
endeavour  to  distinguish  (while,  except  in  broadest  lights,  it 
is  impossible  to  distinguish)  the  work  of  religion  from  that  of 
superstition,  and  the  work  of  reason  from  that  of  infidelity. 
Religion  devotes  the  artist,  hand  and  mind,  to  the  service  of 
the  gods ;  superstition  makes  him  the  slave  of  ecclesiastical 
pride,  or  forbids  his  work  altogether,  in  terror  or  disdain. 
Religion  perfects  the  form  of  the  divine  statue ;  superstition 
distorts  it  into  ghastly  grotesque.  Religion  contemplates  the 
gods  as  the  lords  of  healing  and  life,  surrounds  them  with 
glory  of  affectionate  service,  and  festivity  of  pure  human 


THE   STUDY   OF   ABCHITECTUKE.  19 

beauty.  Superstition  contemplates  its  idols  as  lords  of  death, 
appeases  them  with  blood,  and  vows  itself  to  them  in  torture 
and  solitude.  Religion  proselytizes  by  love,  superstition  by 
war;  religion  teaches  by  example,  superstition  by  persecu 
tion.  Religion  gave  granite  shrine  to  the  Egyptian,  golden 
temple  to  the  Jew,  sculptured  corridor  to  the  Greek,  pillared 
aisle  and  frescoed  wall  to  the  Christian.  Superstition  made 
idols  of  the  splendours  by  which  religion  had  spoken :  reve 
renced  pictures  and  stones,  instead  of  truths ;  letters  and  laws 
instead  of  acts ;  and  for  ever,  in  various  madness  of  fantastic 
desolation,  kneels  in  the  temple  while  it  crucifies  the  Christ. 

On  the  other  hand,  to  reason  resisting  superstition,  we  owe 
the  entire  compass  of  modern  energies  and  sciences :  the 
healthy  laws  of  life,  and  the  possibilities  of  future  progress. 
But  to  infidelity  resisting  religion  (or  which  is  often  enough 
the  case,  taking  the  mask  of  it),  we  owe  sensuality,  cruelty 
and  war,  insolence  and  avarice,  modern  political  economy, 
life  by  conservation  of  forces,  and  salvation  by  every  man's 
looking  after  his  own  interests ;  and  generally,  whatsoever 
of  guilt,  and  folly,  and  death,  there  is  abroad  among  us. 
And  of  the  two,  a  thousand-fold  rather  let  us  retain  some 
colour  of  superstition,  so  that  we  may  keep  also  some 
strength  of  religion,  than  comfort  ourselves  with  colour  :>f 
reason  for  the  desolation  of  godlessness.  I  would  say  to 
every  youth  who  entered  our  schools — be  a  Mahometan,  a 


20  THE  STUDY  OF  ARCHITECTURE. 

Diana-worshipper,  a  Fire-worshipper,  Root-worshipper,  if 
you  will ;  but  at  least  be  so  much  a  man  as  to  know  what 
worship  means.  I  had  rather,  a  million-fold  rather,  see  you 
one  of  those  "  quibus  haec  nascuntur  in  hortis  numina,"  than 
one  of  those  quibus  haec  non  nascuntur  in  cordibus  lumina ; 
and  who  are,  by  everlasting  orphanage,  divided  from  the 
Father  of  Spirits,  who  is  also  the  Father  of  lights,  from 
whom  cometh  every  good  and  perfect  gift. 

"  So  much  of  man,"  I  say,  feeling  profoundly  that  all  right 
exercise  of  any  human  gift,  so  descended  from  the  Giver  of 
good,  depends  on  the  primary  formation  of  the  character  of 
true  manliness  in  the  youth, — that  is  to  say,  of  a  majestic, 
grave,  and  deliberate  strength.  How  strange  the  words 
sound;  how  little  does  it  seem  possible  to  conceive  of 
majesty,  and  gravity,  and  deliberation  in  the  daily  track  of 
modern  life.  Yet,  gentlemen,  we  need  not  hope  that  our 
work  will  be  majestic  if  there  is  no  majesty  in  ourselves. 
The  word  "  manly"  has  come  to  mean  practically,  among  us, 
a  schoolboy's  character,  not  a  man's.  We  are,  at  our  best, 
thoughtlessly  impetuous,  fond  of  adventure  and  excitement ; 
curious  in  knowledge  ibr  its  novelty,  not  for  its  system  and 
results ;  faithful  and  affectionate  to  those  among  whom  we 
are  by  chance  cast,  but  gently  and  calmly  insolent  to  stran 
gers  ;  we  are  stupidly  conscientious,  and  instinctively  brave, 
and  always  ready  to  cast  away  the  lives  we  take  no  pains  to 


THE  STUDY  OF  ARCHITECTURE.  21 

make  valuable,  in  causes  of  which  we  have  never  ascertained 
the  justice.  This  is  our  highest  type — notable  peculiarly 
among  nations  for  its  gentleness,  together  with  its  courage  ; 
but  in  lower  conditions  it  is  especially  liable  to  degradation 
by  its  love  of  jest  and  of  vulgar  sensation.  It  is  against  this 
fatal  tendency  to  vile  play  that  we  have  chiefly  to  contend. 
It  is  the  spirit  of  Milton's  Comus ;  bestial  itself,  but  having 
power  to  arrest  and  paralyze  all  who  come  within  its 
influence,  even  pure  creatures  sitting  helpless,  mocked  by  it 
on  their  marble  thrones.  It  is  incompatible,  not  only  with  all 
greatness  of  character,  but  with  all  true  gladness  of  heart, 
and  it  develops  itself  in  nations  in  proportion  to  their  degra 
dation,  connected  with  a  peculiar  gloom  and  a  singular  ten 
dency  to  play  with  death,  which  is  a  morbid  reaction  from 
the  morbid  excess. 

A  book  has  lately  been  published  on  the  Mythology  of  the 
Rhine,  with  illustrations  by  Gustave  Dore.  The  Rhine  god 
is  represented  in  the  vignette  title-page  with  a  pipe  in  one 
hand  and  a  pot  of  beer  in  the  other.  You  cannot  have  a 
more  complete  type  of  the  tendency  which  is  chiefly  to  be 
dreaded  in  this  age  than  in  this  conception,  as  opposed  to 
any  possibility  of  representation  of  a  river-god,  however 
playful,  in  the  mind  of  a  Greek  painter.  The  example  is  the 
more  notable  because  Gustave  Dore's  is  not  a  common  mind, 
and,  if  born  in  any  other  epoch,  he  would  probably  have 


22  THE   STUDY  OF  ARCHITECTURE. 

done  valuable  (though  never  first-rate)  work ;  but  by  glanc 
ing  (it  will  be  impossible  for  you  to  do  more  than  glance)  at 
his  illustrations  of  Balzac's  "  Contes  Drolatiques,"  you  will 
see  further  how  this  "  drolatique,"  or  semi-comic  mask,  is,  in 
the  truth  of  it,  the  mask  of  a  skull,  and  how  the  tendency  to 
burlesque  jest  is  both  in  France  and  England  only  an  efferves 
cence  from  the  cloaca  maxima  of  the  putrid  instincts  which 
fasten  themselves  on  national  sin,  and  are  in  the  midst  of  the 
luxury  of  European  capitals,  what  Dante  meant  when  he 
wrote,  quel  mi  sveglio  col  puzzo,  of  the  body  of  the  Wealth- 
Siren  ;  the  mocking  levity  and  mocking  gloom  being  equally 
signs  of  the  death  of  the  soul  ;  just  as,  contrariwise, 
a  passionate  seriousness  and  passionate  joyfulness  are  signs 
of  its  full  life  in  works  such  as  those  of  Angelico,  Luini, 
Ghiberti,  or  La  Robbia. 

It  is  to  recover  this  stern  seriousness,  this  pure  and  thrill 
ing  joy,  together  with  perpetual  sense  and  spiritual  presence, 
that  all  true  education  of  youth  must  now  be  directed.  This 
seriousness,  this  passion,  this  universal  human  religion,  are 
the  first  principles,  the  true  roots  of  all  art,  as  they  are  of  all 
doing,  of  all  being.  Get  this  vis  viva  first  and  all  great 
work  will  follow.  Lose  it,  and  your  schools  of  art  will  stand 
among  other  living  schools  as  the  frozen  corpses  stand  by  the 
winding  stair  of  the  St.  Michael's  Convent  of  Mont  Cenis, 
holding  their  hands  stretched  out  under  their  shrouds,  as  if 


THE  STUDY   OF  ARCHITECTURE.  23 

beseeching  the  passer-by  to  look  upon  the  wasting  of  their 
death. 

And  all  the  higher  branches  of  technical  teaching  are  vain 
without  this ;  nay,  are  in  some  sort  vain  altogether,  for  they 
are  superseded  by  this.  You  may  teach  imitation,  because 
the  meanest  man  can  imitate  ;  but  you  can  neither  teach  ideal 
ism  nor  composition,  because  only  a  great  man  can  choose, 
conceive,  or  compose  ;  and  he  does  all  these  necessarily,  and 
because  of  his  nature.  His  greatness  is  in  his  choice  of  things, 
in  his  analysis  of  them ;  and  his  combining  powers  involve 
the  totality  of  his  knowledge  in  life.  His  methods  of  obser 
vation  and  abstraction  are  essential  habits  of  his  thought,  con 
ditions  of  his  being.  If  he  looks  at  a  human  form  he  recog 
nises  the  signs  of  nobility  in  it,  and  loves  them — hates  what 
ever  is  diseased,  frightful,  sinful,  or  designant  of  decay.  All 
ugliness,  and  abortion,  and  fading  away ;  ah1  signs  of  vice 
and  foulness,  he  turns  away  from,  as  inherently  diabolic  and 
horrible ;  all  signs  of  unconquered  emotion  he  regrets,  as 
weaknesses.  He  looks  only  for  the  calm  purity  of  the 
human  creature,  in  living  conquest  of  its  passions  and  of 
fate. 

That  is  idealism ;  but  you  cannot  teach  any  one  else  tha 
preference.     Take  a  man  who  likes  to  see  and  paint  the  gam 
bier's   rage ;   the  hedge-ruffian's  enjoyment ;   the  debauched 
soldier's   strife;  the   vicious  woman's  degradation; — take  a 


24  THE  STUDY   OF  ARCHITECTURE. 

man  fed  on  the  dusky  picturesque  of  rags  and  guilt ;  talk  to 
him  of  principles  of  beauty !  make  him  draw  what  you  will, 
how  you  will,  he  will  leave  the-  stain  of  himself  on  whatever 
he  touches.  You  had  better  go  lecture  to  a  snail,  and  tell  it 
to  leave  no  slime  behind  it.  Try  to  make  a  mean  man  com 
pose;  you  will  find  nothing  in  his  thoughts  consecutive  or 
proportioned — nothing  consistent  in  his  sight — nothing  in  his 
fancy.  He  cannot  comprehend  two  things  in  relation  at  once 
— how  much  less  twenty  !  How  much  less  all !  Everything 
is  uppermost  with  him  in  its  turn,  and  each  as  large  as  the 
rest;  but  Titian  or  Veronese  compose  as  tranquilly  as  they 
would  speak — inevitably.  The  thing  comes  to  them  so — 
they  see  it  so — rightly,  and  in  harmony :  they  will  not  talk 
to  you  of  composition,  hardly  even  understanding  how  lower 
people  see  things  otherwise,  but  knowing  that  if  they  do  see 
otherwise,  there  is  for  them  the  end  there,  talk  as  you  will. 

I  had  intended,  in  conclusion,  gentlemen,  to  incur  such 
blame  of  presumption  as  might  be  involved  in  offering  some 
hints  for  present  practical  methods  in  architectural  schools, 
but  here  again  I  am  checked,  as  I  have  been  throughout,  by 
a  sense  of  the  uselessness  of  all  minor  means  and  helps,  with 
out  the  establishment  of  a  true  and  broad  educational  sys 
tem.  My  wish  would  be  to  see  the  profession  of  the  archi 
tect  united,  not  with  that  of  the  engineer,  but  of  the  sculp 
tor.  I  think  there  should  be  a  separate  school  and  university 


THE  STUDY  OF  ARCHITECTURE.  25 

course  for  engineers,  in  which  the  principal  branches  of  study 
connected  with  that  of  practical  buil'ding  should  be  the  phy 
sical  and  exact  sciences,  and  honours  should  be  taken  i 
mathematics  ;  but  I  think  there  should  be  another  school  and 
university  course  for  the  sculptor  and  architect  in  which  lite 
rature  and  philosophy  should  be  the  associated  branches  of 
study,  and  honours  should  be  taken  in  literis  humanioribus , 
and  I  think  a  young  architect's  examination  for  his  degree 
(for  mere  pass),  should  be  much  stricter  than  that  of  youths 
intending  to  enter  other  professions.  The  quantity  of 
scholarship  necessary  for  the  efficiency  of  a  country  clergy 
man  is  not  great.  So  that  he  be  modest  and  kindly,  the 
main  truths  he  has  to  teach  may  be  learned  better  in  his 
heart  than  in  books,  and  taught  in  very  simple  English.  The 
best  physicians  I  have  known  spent  very  little  time  in  their 
libraries;  and  though  my  lawyer  sometimes  chats  with  me 
over  a  Greek  coin,  I  think  he  regards  the  time  so  spent  in 
the  light  rather  of  concession  to  my  idleness  than  as  helpful 
to  his  professional  labours. 

But  there  is  no  task  undertaken  by  a  true  architect  of 
'which  the  honourable  fulfilment  will  not  require  a  range  of 
knowledge  and  habitual  feeling  only  attainable  by  advanced 
scholarship. 

Since,  however,  such  expansion  of  system  is,  at  present. 

beyond  hope,  the  best  we  can  do  is  to  render  the  studies 

2 


26  THE   STUDY   OF   ARCHITECTURE. 

undertaken  in  our  schools  thoughtful,  reverent,  and  refined, 
according  to  our  power.  Especially  it  should  be  our  aim  to 
prevent  the  minds  of  the  students  from  being  distracted  by 
models  of  an  unworthy  or  mixed  character.  A  museum  is 
one  thing — a  school  another ;  and  I  am  persuaded  that  as  the 
efficiency  of  a  school  of  literature  depends  on  the  mastering 
a  few  good  books,  so  the  efficiency  of  a  school  of  art  will 
depend  on  the  understanding  a  few  good  models.  And  so 
strongly  do  I  feel  this  that  I  would,  for  my  own  part,  at  once 
consent  to  sacrifice  my  personal  predilections  in  art,  and  to 
vote  for  the  exclusion  of  all  Gothic  or  Medieval  models  what 
soever,  if  by  this  sacrifice  I  could  obtain  also  the  exclusion  of 
Byzantine,  Indian,  Renaissance-French,  and  other  more  or 
less  attractive  but  barbarous  work  ;  and  thus  concentrate  the 
mind  of  the  student  wholly  upon  the  study  of  natural  form, 
arid  upon  its  treatment  by  the  sculptors  and  metal  workers 
of  Greece,  Ionia,  Sicily,  and  Magna  Grsecia,  between  500  and 
350  B.C.,  but  I  should  hope  that  exclusiveness  need  not  be 
carried  quite  so  far. 

I  think  Donatello,  Mino  of  Fiesole,  the  Robbias,  Ghiberti, 
Verrocchio,  and  Michael  Angelo,  should  be  adequately  repre 
sented  in  our  schools — together  with  the  Greeks — and  that  a 
few  carefully  chosen  examples  of  the  floral  sculpture  of  the 
North  in  the  thirteenth  century  should  be  added,  with  espe 
cial  view  to  display  the  treatment  of  naturalistic  ornament  in 


THE  STUDY  OF  ARCHITECTURE.  27 

subtle  connexion  with  constructive  requirements  ;  and  in  the 
course  of  study  pursued  with  reference  to  these  models,  as 
of  admitted  perfection,  I  should  endeavour  first  to  make  the 
student  thoroughly  acquainted  with  the  natural  forms  and 
characters  of  the  objects  he  had  to  treat,  and  then  to  exercise 
him  in  the  abstraction  of  these  forms,  and  the  suggestion  of 
these  characters,  under  due  sculptural  limitation.  He  should 
first  be  taught  to  draw  largely  and  simply ;  -then  he  should 
make  quick  and  firm  sketches  of  flowers,  animals,  drapery, 
and  figures,  from  nature,  in  the  simplest  terms  of  line,  and 
light,  and  shade ;  always  being  taught  to  look  at  the  organic 
actions  and  masses,  not  at  the  textures  or  accidental  effects 
of  shade  ;  meantime  his  sentiment  respecting  all  these  things 
should  be  cultivated  by  close  and  constant  inquiry  into  their 
mythological  significance  and  associated  traditions;  then, 
knowing  the  things  and  creatures  thoroughly,  and  regarding 
them  through  an  atmosphere  of  enchanted  memory,  he 
should  be  shown  how  the  facts  he  has  taken  so  long  to  learn 
are  summed  up  by  a  great  sculptor  in  a  few  touches :  how 
those  touches  are  invariably  arranged  in  musical  and  decora 
tive  relations  ;  how  every  detail  unnecessary  for  his  purpose 
is  refused  ;  how  those  necessary  for  his  purpose  are  insisted 
upon,  or  even  exaggerated,  or  represented  by  singular  arti 
fice,  when  literal  representation  is  impossible;  and  how  all 
this  is  done  under  the  instinct  and  passion  of  an  inner  com- 


28  THE  STUDY  OF  ARCHITECTURE. 

manding  spirit  which  it  is  indeed  impossible  to  imitate,  but 
possible,  perhaps,  to  share. 

Perhaps!  Pardon  me  that  I  speak  despondingly.  For 
my  own  part,  I  feel  the  force  of  mechanism  and  the  fury  of 
avaricious  commerce  to  be  at  present  so  irresistible,  that  I 
have  seceded  from  the  study  not  only  of  architecture,  but 
nearly  of  all  art ;  and  have  given  myself,  as  I  would  in  a 
besieged  city,  to  seek  the  best  modes  of  getting  bread  and 
water  for  its  multitudes,  there  remaining  no  question,  it 
seems  to  me,  of  other  than  such  grave  business  for  the  time. 
But  there  is,  at  least,  this  ground  for  courage,  if  not  for 
hope :  As  the  evil  spirits  of  avarice  and  luxury  are  directly 
contrary  to  art,  so,  also,  art  is  directly  contrary  to  them ; 
and  according  to  its  force  expulsive  of  them  and  medicinal 
against  them ;  so  that  the  establishment  of  such  schools  as  I 
have  ventured  to  describe — whatever  their  immediate  suc 
cess  or  ill-success  in  the  teaching  of  art — would  yet  be  the 
directest  method  of  resistance  to  those  conditions  of  evil 
among  which  our  youth  are  cast  at  the  most  critical  period 
of  their  lives.  We  may  not  be  able  to  produce  architecture, 
but,  at  the  least,  we  shall  resist  vice.  I  do  not  know  if  it 
has  been  observed  that  while  Dante  rightly  connects  archi 
tecture,  as  the  most  permanent  expression  of  the  pride  of 
humanity,  whether  just  or  unjust,  with  the  first  cornice  of 
Purgatory,  he  indicates  its  noble  function  by  engraving  upon 


THE  STUDY  OF  ARCHITECTURE.  29 

it,  in  perfect  sculpture,  the  stories  which  rebuke  the  errors 
and  purify  the  purposes  of  noblest  souls.  In  the  fulfilment 
of  such  function,  literally  and  practically,  here  among  men, 
is  the  only  real  use  or  piide  of  noble  architecture,  and  on  its 
acceptance  or  surrender  of  that  function  it  depends  whether, 
in  future,  the  cities  of  England  melt  into  a  ruin  more  con 
fused  and  ghastly  than  ever  storm  wasted  or  wolf  inhabited, 
or  purge  and  exalt  themselves  into  true  habitations  of 
men,  whose  walls  shall  be  Safety,  and  whose  gates  shall  be 
Praise. 


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